Around the beginning of Year Two, post-vanderleun, Shorters written in Bizarroese began to appear.

So, I followed the link and read the comments. Wow! Is there nothing that isn’t some sort of conspiracy to these people? It’s easy to imagine them fuming at a stoplight because the liberals and their allies the Illuminati and the Elders of Zion chose a treehugger color for “go,” the yellow of cowardice for “slow down,” and that commie red for “stop.” They must spend a bleedin’ fortune on tinfoil. And none of them are able to recall that this is the same paper that sat on the NSA warrantless wiretap story until after the 2004 election because it might have affected the outcome.

“Somehow I think that’s a lesson that will be forgotten as soon as someone in a uniform faces the same fate.”
Let’s not make this too difficult. Any lurkimg wingnuts out there got an example of any time in the past say, 100 years that the NYT released information against the advice of the military that put anyone in a uniform in danger?

My brain hurts.

No, the media never conspires together in the dark.

Urm. They conspire in the dark? How do they see their lattes and french wine if they are in the dark? For the love of Stalin, somebody turn a light on!

“Mithridate Ombud”? One suspects the work of JanusNode.

Mithridatism is the practice of protecting oneself against a poison by gradually self-administering non-lethal amounts.

I was doing that for years before I found out there was a word for it.

conspires together
PLEONASM FAIL

If we don’t conspire together, shirley we will all conspire separately.

Yeah, the New York Times can’t keep a secret because they’re just so gosh-darned liberal. Was it the Chicago Tribune that printed a story that the Japanese were setting their depth charges so shallow that our subs could go deep and get away? Of course, they read this and corrected the problem.

Maybe the Tribune was retroactively infected with liberalism because 65 years later they’d endorse a Democrat for president for the first time in their history. Yeah, that’s the ticket!

Is there nothing that isn’t some sort of conspiracy to these people?

If there weren’t a shadowy cabal conspiring against them, they’d all be gajillionaires with supermodel wives.

I don’t even know WTF you’re talking about, but it was really funny anyway.

THAT’s genius.

Thanks as always.

If there weren’t a shadowy cabal conspiring against them, they’d all be gajillionaires with supermodel wives.
LOL! There’s always somebody keepin’ the White Man down.

That’s one crappy ombuddy.

The Times withheld this information along with at least 40 other news outlets. No, the media never conspires together in the dark.

1 attempt to keep a guy alive = proof of infinity conspiracy theories.

1 attempt to keep a guy alive = proof of infinity conspiracy theories.
It never even occurred to the wingers that the other news outlets sat on the story because it was the right thing to do – even at the cost of forgoing a few days’ breathless headlines. Conservatism has become a mental illness.

slighty o/t but goes well with this post’s title,

The Leftist horrors that have joined our military
OK Matt: now do a story on the leftist nutters from the Ayers school of revolution, the Muslims, the Black Muslims, the pacifist nutters from the Left, and varied Hispanic gang members who have joined the military. Bet you won’t.

Salon comments

dude has a clownhall blog if you wish to go where angels fear to tread.

Thank god someone around here managed to shut that Rightard,Brad, up.

Does Mithridate Ombud keep an eye on the right-wings sacred cows?

Sorry, I’ll go and get my coat.

Of course the Hispanic gang members aren’t being waivered into the Army because Bush couldn’t resist the urge to “take some crappy little country and throw it against the wall.”

I heard that the terrorists grew gills after they read the NYT article on waterboarding.

Sweet Jesus NYT why did you have to print that! We’ve been foiled.

Terrorists don’t read newspapers. They read the Yellow Pages, looking for flight schools and airline booking agents and such. You know, the free market.

The only real mystery is why the The New York Times didn’t reward the Taliban and ask to have its babies that’s how much they love the terrists.

Because that’s not the hole the NYT likes to use

It’s too bad the terrorists weren’t blowing Clinton because we would’ve been all over that

The sig line of one commenter is priceless.

Doubling down on stupid is not a particularly good idea. ~Andrew Breitbart

If anybody ought to know—

It’s like that MST3k episode where the line on the screen is, “The blood of Uranus shall not go unavenged!!!” and all they can do is turn their heads to look at each other.

Any lurkimg wingnuts out there got an example of any time in the past say, 100 years that the NYT released information against the advice of the military that put anyone in a uniform in danger?

Y’know, the way Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers proved the US knew they were going to lose in Viet Nam but kept drafting and sending soldiers, totally made us lose Viet Nam.

The only real mystery is why the The New York Times didn’t reward the Taliban and ask to have its babies that’s how much they love the terrists.

That’s only ’cause the Times wouldn’t be able to get pregant from the gay-butt Taliban and, like, then abort it’s fetuses and crack smoke them with Barakca Hitler Osama.

Those crazed enough to click to NewsBusters might as well click on “NewsBusted” in the upper right there.

Let me know what it’s like.

I read the comments over there and I don’t even understand what they’re saying. Or rather why. No, what.

It was bad because they didn’t give the terrorists the publicity they wanted but they didn’t do the same about a soldier? Or something? They can keep a secret when it’s “one of their own”, but not….

Nope, still not getting it.

The Peak Wingnut theory is being proved daily. The code words and dog whistles have taken over to where that’s all there is.

Bizarro language no am confusing. It make head no hurt anymore.

Does it occur to the wingers that it is sort of the job of a newspaper not to keep secrets? And to answer my own query above, I guess the Times did print that Valerie Plame thing endangering everybody she’d associated with. I remember the big Newsbusters outrage about how wrong that was.

This story was kept silent because the New York Times didn’t want the reporter to be able to tell the true story of how the New York Times is cooperating with the Taliban to kidnap journalists. It’s very clear.

It’s like that MST3k episode where the line on the screen is

Had to look up MST3k, my finger is so not on the pulse………..

@lobbey: I wish CNN would switch to the MST3k format for all its reportage.

Oh, Meghan, your Mithridate is here!

“And now, the Situation Room.”
“Jimmy Smits.”

Terence, This Is Stupid Stuff (Stanza, the last)
A.E. Housman

There was a king reigned in the East:
There, when kings will sit to feast, 60
They get their fill before they think
With poisoned meat and poisoned drink.
He gathered all the springs to birth
From the many-venomed earth;
First a little, thence to more, 65
He sampled all her killing store;
And easy, smiling, seasoned sound,
Sate the king when healths went round.
They put arsenic in his meat
And stared aghast to watch him eat; 70
They poured strychnine in his cup
And shook to see him drink it up:
They shook, they stared as white’s their shirt:
Them it was their poison hurt.
—I tell the tale that I heard told. 75
Mithridates, he died old.

Y’know, the way Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers proved the US knew they were going to lose in Viet Nam but kept drafting and sending soldiers, totally made us lose Viet Nam.
Yeah, I was there in ’71-’72. The facts that still we controlled nothing that wasn’t directly under the muzzles of our guns and that the Vietnamese simply wanted us to go home and stop blowing the piss out of the countryside had nothing to do with the outcome there.
/Shakes fist at Daniel Ellsberg.
It amazes me that some of the dickheads are actually peddling the line that we could have won Vietnam. Maybe they mean that if we’d just kept the war going for afew more years St. Ronnie would have gone over there and single-handedly whipped their asses just as he single-handedly toppled the Soviet Union.

Come on, Dennis.

EVERYBODY KNOWS that the dirty fucking hippies stabbed us in the back, not to mention sapped our precious bodily fluids.

Ask Dick Cheney!

The code words and dog whistles have taken over to where that’s all there is.

Hey, you try listening to nothing but talk radio and reading nothing but blast faxes for thirty fucking years and see how coherent you are.

EVERYBODY KNOWS that the dirty fucking hippies stabbed us in the back, not to mention sapped our precious bodily fluids.
Heh! Glad that you cleared that up. Old age must be getting the better of me because I seem to remember getting more shit from the VFW and American Legion types than I ever did from the DFH’s.

Mithridate,
Are you ready for your Mithridate?
Don’t be late;
It could be fate!
Open the door
For your
Mithridate!

Big Media Clams Up For Little Reporter! Reporter Not Even Journalist! Why Tragedy Not Happen To Soldier Instead? Then Big Media Not Keep Quiet, We Suppose! Don’t Ask Why We Suppose That, We Suppose First And Think About It After!

Keller was on NPR — it’s funny already! — talking about how hard it was for trained newsies to withhold news.

Like the warrantless wiretapping story that they sat on for over a year, until after Kerry had safely conceded.

Laugh and a half Keller, they call him.

I don’t suppose the Nice Polite Republicans asked Keller why the NYT doesn’t call it torture when we do it.

I worked as a reporter for years. Reporters learn all sorts of shit they don’t, won’t or can’t publish or air. The telling point in such situations are the rationales deployed for not letting the rest of the world know. In some cases, things can’t be confirmed to the threshold the news organization holds dear to. Sometimes it is politics or deference to power. In some cases more extraordinary forces are at work. The NYT wanted to try and protect its reporter who was doing an extremely dangerous job in a very hairy place (underscored by his kidnapping, of course). The NYT can suck with the best of the major media at times, in this case their actions ( or lack thereof) seem to be so within the scope of reasonable behavior you just wonder when a planet in the shape of a cube will actually be discovered (and B flight will be arranged).

The media really does conspire. I doubt they do it in the dark.

Ever seen a TV report about paid Pentagon spokespeople doing ‘news analysis’?

If they do it in once instance, it’s more likely that they do it all the time than only did it once.

You know this story must be tying Malkin up in knots, I mean, I guess the usual, because who can she hate worse? Teh Taliban Mooozlims or the NYT?

Maybe they mean that if we’d just kept the war going for afew more years St. Ronnie would have gone over there and single-handedly whipped their asses just as he single-handedly toppled the Soviet Union.

I think they really just wanted it to go on a few more years so a Democratic President could be blamed loudly and without end for losing the war and pulling out. Because, seriously, if you can’t win a war in ten years, why not try for twenty?

Our Nation’s Enemies Not Kill Citizen! We Very Sad Now! We Want Enemies To Act Like We Expect Rather Than Our Citizens Be Safe! Big Media Conglomerate, Which We Hate, Acts Exactly Like Big Corporation, Which We Love, And That Makes Us Sad Again! War Heats Up In Kirkuk, Might Delay Our Soldiers Returning To Their Loved Ones, That Makes Us Happy! Our President Keeping Us Out Of Messy Situation In Iran, Which Makes Us Sad!

Because, seriously, if you can’t win a war in ten years, why not try for twenty?
We were spreading democracy in SE Asia from 1959 to 1975. Make it thirty years. “Clinton lost Vietnam!” would have suited the wingers to a T.

Wingnuts are just jealous. The Taliban had the balls to do something they don’t have the nuts to do.

I seem to remember getting more shit from the VFW and American Legion types than I ever did from the DFH’s

When I was in elementary school, the reliable blowhards would love to explain how you troops were too drugged up to win.

The transformation to Teh DFH Spat on our Troops! shows everything you need to know about Wingnuttien public psychology. It’s all projection of malice–just move the archetypes around, ’cause the memes never really mattered.

you just wonder when a planet in the shape of a cube will actually be discovered (and B flight will be arranged).

I can’t possibly be the only nerdly one who heard the details of the first extrasolar terrestrial planet and thought ‘ZOMG, that’s Krytpon!’

By the way, fuck this entire discussion, because, again, as Dennis said above, the New York Times had no god damn problem holding off from running the NSA warrantless wiretapping story so the Chimperor could get “re” elected in 2004. Fuck these assholes pretending that the NYT is some sort of publication which runs anything it can. Fuck ’em.

El Cid, I happened to read Ann Althouse’s comments yesterday.²

Thursday, the Wapoo fired Dan Froomkin, a reporter who criticised Obama, just as he criticized Bush, from teh Left. (And Fred Hiatt, WaPoo editmatorial chieftain, promptly followed this up by publishing Krauthammer’s weekly “I HATE OBAMA – BOMB MORE ARABS” screed next to one by the ever credible Paul Wolfowitz screeching the exact same thing.)

So what do the Blartists have to say?

Maybe Obama isn’t the Marxist-Socialist they all claim? Maybe the Fucking Wapoo isn’t a liberally liberal bunch of DFH’s, but more of a flock of neocons?

No, none of that. Hah hah, we hate the liberal Froomkin, see that’s what you get liberal Obama, hardy hardy har har liberal WaPoo!!1one!

Blogger John said…

The first people leftists shoot are the ones on their side not viewed as pure enough. No criticism of The Obama will be tolerated.
8:46 AM

They’re idiots. By their own willful decision to be so.

And they won’t ‘get it’ until it’s up close and personal, like when their own insurance company drops a member of their own family for the crime of getting sick.

² It’s research for my new project, The Journal of LOL Althouse Poetry

El Cid, the NSA business was just the garnish on the shitburger that the media had been serving up for four years at the time. None of them found it in themselves to even question why, after invading Afghanistan, we had to invade a country that hadn’t attacked us, had no credible navy or air force, no WMD’s according to Hans Blix, and that had served as a counterpoise to Iran for years. It wasn’t enough for them to unquestioningly cheer lead for that war, they found it necessary to bury us under endless gun camera war porn and sycophantic drivel from embedded (in-bed-with) reporters who used more military jargon than the military people. Fucking inbred jizz-licking sellouts, every last one of them.

Off Topic (It’s a Wing-Nut, so not really.):

You may remember Dr. Sanity.

I just saw her on the Science Channel, blathering about the psychological whatnot of a manned Mars mission. (She had about two sentences.)

Whatever. The point being, I wouldn’t have known it was the good Dr., if her profile picture, which must have been taken at least 20 yrs. ago, hadn’t been shown. Whenever it was shot, she has gained quite a few lbs., a pair of giant, ugly glasses, & a butchy haircut.

Who knows if she’s still a NASA wage-slave, but I can’t imagine she gets much work as an aerospace head-candler w/o gummint money. So why hasn’t B. Hussein Pol Pot Obama (hated by the doc w/ the white heat of a million suns) shut her down, cut all her contracts, etc.?

It’s almost as if everything being whined by the whining losers about censorship, free speech, & the like, in reference to the Obama admin., is a fucking lie or something.

Where all my Sadlies at?

From the front to back.

Sen.Lugar doesn’t want us to have to use “Tweeter” to get info from Iran.

Dennis-SGMM said”
“It amazes me that some of the dickheads are actually peddling the line that we could have won Vietnam.”

The rules of engagement were such that we were assured of if not losing then dragging the conflict on much longer than need be. They were ridiculous rules like you could only fire back at enemy positions while standing on your left foot on Tuesdays (or something like that).

So then the thing to tell the wingers is: “Your buddies died in Nam because the MIC wanted to suck more money from the US taxpayers.”

Chomsky seems to believe that this should be enough. That if you tell the wingers the truth about how they’ve been used they will turn and stop supporting the power structure. I rather doubt it.

They won’t even believe the “truth” (As we all see it, which is still objectively closer to “reality” as we see it.) no matter how it’s presented.

Anyway.

That if you tell the wingers the truth about how they’ve been used they will turn and stop supporting the power structure. I rather doubt it.

Seeing as how it has been yelled from the rooftops by some of the best and the brightest (not to mention most decorated) of the military for more than a few generations now, I doubt it too. It’s hardly just a DFH thing. If anyone has gone too long without reading this, I suggest a refresher. I had a better pdf link, but firefox seems to dislike opening such things at the moment.

There were rules of engagement?

Hmmm. You sure?

‘Cause I was incountry for ten months and nobody ever mentioned ’em to me.

Oh! Unless you mean when they said “kill the gooks”.

But if you are making some kind of assumption that there were rules of engagement in vietnam that prevented the us from “winning”, you are grossly misinformed.

The american war in vietnam was unwinnable because to invade and occupy north vietnam would have resulted in a nuclear exchange.

Wars in the nuclear era very often cannot be won, for to escalate beyond a certain point is for all parties to lose…

mikeyh

“The ones that run are Viet Cong. The ones that don’t run are well-disciplined Viet Cong.”

One of my favorite lines from Full Metal Jacket.

Mikey gets to the heart of it. The idea that a Nuclear war is ‘unwinnable’ is dismissed as a “Liberal” idea.

“WE could have won in Vietnam if pussy libs hadn’t kept us from Nuking the place.”

I don’t know, I guess people who find explosions and destruction the highest form of entertainment, “A Nuke” must be orgasmic.

Jimbo Treacher left a flaming bag of dog shit on Sadly’s porch.

http://jimtreacher.com/archives/002084.html

Seriously, this is one stupid fucktard.

Literary reference time:

As Urquhart is led away by the police, Wimsey says, “Mithridates, he died old.” This is a line from A.E. Housman’s A Shropshire Lad, referring to King Mithridates VI of Pontus, who supposedly built tolerance against a whole range of deadly poisons by the same method as Urquhart.

Seriously, this is one stupid fucktard.

That whole ice cream thing is really catching on with them, which is a pretty good indication that it’s sub-mental horseshit.

Mikey gets to the heart of it. The idea that a Nuclear war is ‘unwinnable’ is dismissed as a “Liberal” idea.

Very true.

I commanded nuclear weapons in SAC. I’m well versed in the effects of nuclear weapons.

In a full-scale nuclear laydown on the United States, nothing east of the Mississippi would live and very little to the west of it either.

nothing east of the Mississippi would live and very little to the west of it either.

But if that’s the way Jesus wants it…

From the Treacher dump:

Confection accomplished. Heck of a glob, Barry. Barack Obama doesn’t care about lactose-intolerant people. “Now watch this drive… to the ice cream shop.”

The wingtards also seem to think it’s a good idea to try to put down Obama by comparing him to Bush. How that’s supposed to work, I’m not sure – didn’t they all vote for Bush twice and issue cowardly anonymous death threats against liberals who dared to criticize Dumbya?

I’m waiting for mikey to weigh in on the burning issue of A.E. Housman and Stupid stuff.

No, wait. Is that Treacher post a parody? Because no one could be that stupid. It’s even stupider than Colonel Mustard. Are they competing, maybe?

My favorite part?

In all fairness, that pic is from a previous ice-cream run

So we have – “How dare The One smile like this on a day when around the world others are suffering,” followed by, “well actually this is a smile on a different day.”

I also like how Treacher is somehow equating the WTC attack with the Iranian situation, as if there’s any reasonable parallel to be drawn between the two. One was an emergency within the United States — you know, the country that George Bush was the chief executive of — and the other is an ongoing struggle inside Iran, which is (unbelievably) not a territory or vassal state of the US, and in which Barack Obama has no authority.

The President must never, ever have a moment’s enjoyment with his young children, since someone in the world is suffering and dying against a repressive government. Ideally Obama would chain and beat his daughters so that they understood the horrors that others are suffering.

I commanded nuclear weapons in SAC.

I hear some of them can be “discipline problems.”

Like the government didn’t see this coming.

Goldman to make record bonus payout

Staff at Goldman Sachs staff can look forward to the biggest bonus payouts in the firm’s 140-year history after a spectacular first half of the year, sparking concern that the big investment banks which survived the credit crunch will derail financial regulation reforms.

A lack of competition and a surge in revenues from trading foreign currency, bonds and fixed-income products has sent profits at Goldman Sachs soaring, according to insiders at the firm.

Staff in London were briefed last week on the banking and securities company’s prospects and told they could look forward to bumper bonuses if, as predicted, it completed its most profitable year ever. Figures next month detailing the firm’s second-quarter earnings are expected to show a further jump in profits. Warren Buffett, who bought $5bn of the company’s shares in January, has already made a $1bn gain on his investment.

Goldman is expected to be the biggest winner in the race for revenues that, in 2006, reached £186bn across the entire industry. While this figure is expected to fall to £160bn in 2009, it will be split among a smaller number of firms.

Barclays Capital, Credit Suisse and Deutsche Bank are among the European firms expected to register bumper profits, along with US banks JP Morgan and Morgan Stanley following the near collapse and government rescue of major trading houses including Citigroup, Merrill Lynch, UBS and Royal Bank of Scotland.

In April, Goldman said it would set aside half of its £1.2bn first-quarter profit to reward staff, much of it in bonuses. It is believed to have paid 973 bankers $1m or more last year, while this year’s payouts are on track to be the highest for most of the bank’s 28,000 staff, including about 5,400 in London.

Critics of the bonus culture in the City said the dominance of a few risk-taking investment banks is undermining the efforts of regulators to stabilise the financial system.

Vince Cable, the Liberal Democrat treasury spokesman, said: “The investment banks more than any other institutions created the culture of excessive leverage, excessive risk and excessive bonuses that led to the downfall of the financial system. Now they are cashing in and the same bonus culture has returned. The result must be that we are being pushed to the edge of another crash.”

Goldman Sachs said it reviewed its bonus scheme last year and switched from a system of guaranteed rewards that were paid over three years to variable payments that tied staff to the firm. It told employees last year that profit-related bonuses would be delayed by 12 months.

Until the release of its first quarter profits in April, it seemed inconceivable that a firm owing the US government $10bn would be looking to break all-time records in 2009.

David Williams, an investment banking analyst at Fox Pitt Kelton, said: “This year is shaping up to be the best year ever for investment banks, or at least those that have emerged relatively unscathed from the credit crisis.

“These banks are intermediaries in the bond markets where governments and companies are raising billions of pounds of new money. There is also a lack of competition that means they can charge huge sums for doing business.”

Last week, the firm predicted that President Barack Obama’s government could issue $3.25tn of debt before September, almost four times last year’s sum. Goldman, a prime broker of US government bonds, is expected to make hundreds of millions of dollars in profits from selling and dealing in the bonds.

The wingtards also seem to think it’s a good idea to try to put down Obama by comparing him to Bush. How that’s supposed to work, I’m not sure – didn’t they all vote for Bush twice and issue cowardly anonymous death threats against liberals who dared to criticize Dumbya?

If they can’t be happy with their president, then nobody can. They’re hopping up and down and shouting about all the things Obama is doing that makes him just like Bush, like eating food and having leisure activities once in a while, except the obvious ones relating to state privilege and the unitary executive. So basically, every time they’re like “HOW DARE OBAMA EAT AN ICE CREAM” they’re failing in not just one, but two ways.

Not a parody. Patterico worked very hard on the inspiration for it.

As mentioned here, which was not a pimping of anyone’s web log at all.

“The ones that run are Viet Cong. The ones that don’t run are well-disciplined Viet Cong.”
I always heard that the Viet Cong were farmers with machine guns. They ran when when you returned fire. If they stayed and fought, they were NVA.

Ummm, Mr. Treacher? Hellooooo? Yes, you, over there. I confess that I don’t quite understand your animus toward the President of the United States, But that’s not important at the moment. I have one simple question for you. What the bloody fuck do want the President of the U.S. to do, exactly? No really, I’m serious. WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU WANT?

Wouldn’t you really like to jump off a tall building? Isn’t that what you want? You’d get lots of attention. You’d really show ’em, yes you would! G’wan… g’head. Take the elevator – don’t want to exert y’sef now.

Obviously the big O should’ve gone on vacation and brutalized some brush like a real, engaged president, or maybe sat staring blankly into space. Oh for the days when the adults were in charge.

The valiant members of the 101st Chairborne surely envision a pincer movement of troops into Iran from Iraq and Afghanistan. What could possibly go wrong, who could anticipate, and like as?

I’m waiting for mikey to weigh in on the burning issue of A.E. Housman and Stupid stuff.

Houseman spelled it wrong.

That’s it. All I’ve got…

mikey

I always heard that the Viet Cong were farmers with machine guns. They ran when when you returned fire. If they stayed and fought, they were NVA.

You’ll have to confirm that with some REALLY old grunts. By the time I got there in1970 it was all NVA, all the time.

Well, except for your occasional Khmers that got those crappy maps from Prince Sihanouk. Those dudes had a real attitude when it came to round eyes…

mikey

I followed the Patterico link. I will not do that again.

Moussavi/Palin 2012. The mind boggles, then vomits, then shuts down in despair.

I always heard that the Viet Cong were farmers with machine guns. They ran when when you returned fire. If they stayed and fought, they were NVA.
Sort of like those farmers at Concord Bridge or Yorktown. At some point in the Sixties the NVA became the primary opposition in I-III Corps, while the VC remained the primary opposition in IV Corps until war’s end. I was stationed in IV Corps at a small Navy riverine forces base on the southernmost branch of the Mekong River. No, the VC didn’t run away when you returned fire. Because most of them were locals who had day jobs they used ambush or hit and run tactics and they for the most part avoided avoided protracted battles. Many of them were skilled and experienced fighters having already fought the French and some of their senior commanders had fought the Japanese and then the French and then us. So they did know what they were doing. Besides small arms, they were equipped with the ubiquitous b40 rocket launcher (Now known as an RPG), rockets up to 200mm in diameter, 60 and 80mm mortars, grenades, and satchel charges, as well as the .51 cal machine gun. They could and did lay down indirect fire, snipe, launch sapper attacks, shoot down helicopters and sink armed river craft. They were extremely patient, masterful at booby trapping and planting anti-personnel mines. They may have been farmers or fisherman but they were also, in their way, patriots and/or ideologues and they were often very, very, dangerous.

The mind boggles, then vomits, then shuts down in despair self-defense.

Damn you, WP!

The mind boggles, then vomits, then shuts down in despair self-defense.

Addendum: Vietnam was divided into four Corps, or areas of operation. The division was roughly by fourths from north to south with I Corps being the northernmost and IV Corps being the southernmost.
And now, back to our program in progress…

The wingtards also seem to think it’s a good idea to try to put down Obama by comparing him to Bush.

I think it’s just that they’re certain projection is something that only other people do.

I see our “Carter” still can’t muster up the scrotum to tell the Mad Mullahs to piss off for good. Why do we tolerate such a weak, pussy- ass leader?

Why do we tolerate such a weak, pussy- ass leader?

I always ask repigs the same thing about the way El Chimpo ran and hid after the WTC fell down. Their reply is always “I’m going to shoot you for making it obvious that I love cowardly war criminals”

I wonder how many changes of underwear George Bush Jr. needed while he was flying away and hiding from his greatest failure ever when his hostility to any anti-terrorist preparation allowed the 9/11/2001 attacks?

I’m thinking he had to change his underwear — and maybe his pants, and maybe his Air Force 1 seat cushion — at least twice a day, before Uncle Dick told him that he could distract the public from this gigantic traitorous failure if he could gin up a big enough war.

LOLORGY!

Is Bohunkulus Orgono there perchance referring to the same NYT that gently softpedalled Pappy Bush’s vintage SS response to the fleeing civilians & soldiers on the Highway of Death out of Kuwait in 1991?

Obama’s had about the exact same flak from the EmEssEm as Shrub got – but even with the abject & moribund results of its ongoing nanoid spewings of filler where information used to be kicking them in the face, has its content suggested An IQ Jump We Can Believe In, my friends?

Sadly, fuck noes.

Is Bohunkulus Orgono there perchance referring to the same NYT that gently softpedalled Pappy Bush’s vintage SS response to the fleeing civilians & soldiers on the Highway of Death out of Kuwait in 1991?

It was my understanding that this degree of recollection is not allowed, that in discussions of this event there may only be mentions of the greatest coalition EVAR assembled and the ‘liberation’ of Kuwait. The faked stories of the babies thrown out of non-existent incubators and the carpet bombing of Iraqi civilians is also disallowed.

I see our “Carter” still can’t muster up the scrotum to tell the Mad Mullahs to piss off for good.
Seein’ as how you’re a bit weak in the head I’ll skip the invective. Any anti-mullah verbiage by the US will simply enhance the power and prestige of the mullahs so telling them to piss off will accomplish exactly dick. They stay in power by maintaining a state of tension vis-a-vis the west. America’s best option at present is to STFU because there is still a substantial part of the Iranian populace who (deservedly) mistrusts western meddling in the affairs of their country and who would be more than willing to buy into the notion that those who are currently protesting the election there are merely tools of western interests. I understand that running your mouths without putting your own bodies on the line is a passion with mindless neocons but, in this instance, silence is golden.

I bet the Obamamessiah is the one pissing his diapers now!

“HELP ME JIMMY CARTER! YOU’RE MY ONLY HOPE!”

LOL! Dumbass.

Maybe Obama should take after Reagan and sell arms to the “mad mullahs.”

Maybe Obama should take after Reagan and sell arms to the “mad mullahs.”

Yeah, but he’d have to make sure to have some South American death squads to send money & weapons to, otherwise he won’t be able to jack off to the thoughts of infants’ heads being bashed into trees.

Yeah, but he’d have to make sure to have some South American death squads to send money & weapons to

Not that it was his idea, but mumbleplancolombiamumble.

Maybe Obama should take after Reagan and sell arms to the “mad mullahs.”

I dunno – Reagan’s servile attempts at appeasement didn’t manage to appease the mad mullahs, who he was trying to appease.

m13ky said,

“There were rules of engagement?
Hmmm. You sure?”

Yeah, pretty sure.

Even though in 1972 many in Washington knew that the 4-year-old Johnson-McNamara nonsensical rules of engagement were strategically, operationally and tactically counterproductive, no one, civilian or military, made any effort to change them. Therefore, when Jack Lavelle sent that ’shoot back’ order to his troops, he got in very hot water.

“You’ll have to confirm that with some REALLY old grunts. By the time I got there in1970 it was all NVA, all the time.”

No offense was intended. Just that the restrictions placed on the military seemed designed to prolong the war. McNamara’s sanctuary policy gave the enemy a place to go to recoup. Did we give the Germans sanctuaries? Were allies who returned fire on German AAA subject to instant court-martial?

Not allowing return fire seems odd to me. But I am presuming motive: “Let’s prolong the war because it fills the war coffers” just as I suppose those on the right are also presuming motive “Those bungling bureaucrats and bleeding heart libs won’t let us win the war”.

I can see now that I may have engaged in some conspiracy thinking by believing I can infer intent on the part of McNamara. That’s wrong and I’m regret doing so. My apologies.

Not that it was his idea, but mumbleplancolombiamumble.

Not that it really matters, but yet another really, really close [former] adviser to President Uribe is under investigation for close collaboration with the right wing narco-paramilitary death squads while his very closest adviser is being investigated in relation to a massive gigantic illegal electronic spying scandal of using U.S. provided equipment to spy on the Supreme Court, prosecutors, the opposition, journalists, businessmen, and human rights observers,, but obviously if you think our grand ally and Hero of South American Democracy (TM) per the Washington Post‘s Jackson Diehl Uribe has had anything to do with these drug-dealing massacre and / or illegal spying types, you’re a crazy left wing moonbat.

Jackson Diehl is Fred Hiatt’s side kick.

A tough challenge would be to determine which of the two slugs is stupider.

Not allowing return fire seems odd to me

I’m sorry. You’ve got me pretty baffled. Are we still talking about vietnam?

I never saw any hesitation to “return fire”.

In fact, we had more guns, more bullets and more high explosives, so we tended to shoot first, more and much more randomly.

You ever hear the term “recon by fire”? I hardly think an army that wasn’t allowed to “return fire” would do that. You have your ma deuce or m60 gunner put fifty rounds downrange just to see what would happen.

You ever see a pair of gunships light up a ville? Miniguns, rockets, two minutes in and out, and nothing, not humans, not livestock, not rats is alive in there. That sound like a restriction on “returning fire” to you?

You ever hear of “BDA”? That’s Bomb. Damage. Assessment. You send a company into an area that’s been hit by BUFFs. And they go back to battalion and report on the damage. Essentially everything is not just dead, but in pieces.

I don’t know where you get your information about vietnam, but I’d suggest you spend some time with a couple vets. ‘Cause one of the problems of that conflict was not an american lack of will to lay down fire…

mikey

Treacher, there’s this thing.

Well, bigger than a ‘thing’, actually, it’s more like a ‘law of the universe’. A rule that all things in the universe must follow, called ‘causality’. You may even have heard of it at some point back during your edumacation (assuming you had one). It is when one event is the direct ’cause’ of another subsequent event.

One major difference between Obama’s eating ice cream after (before?) the violent crackdown on protests in Iran and Bush’s playing golf after the Iraq War proved to be a total bloody FUBAR, is that Obama did not ’cause’ the violent crackdown in Iran, whereas Bush did DIRECTLY ’cause’ the Iraq War and ought to have taken some ‘responsibility’ for it other than giving up golf. (Yeah, that’s right. I said ‘responsibility’. I may be mistaken, but I think it used to be one of you cons’ fave buzzwords.)

Also, Barack Obama is aware not only of all internet traditions, but also of the possibility that if he does ‘take action’ in Iran, that it would in all probability ’cause’ a FAIL of epic proportions.

m13ky said,

I never saw any hesitation to “return fire”.

You haven’t watched enough Rambo, mikey.

Rambo: Nothing is over! Nothing! You just don’t turn it off! It wasn’t my war! You asked me, I didn’t ask you! And I did what I had to do to win! But somebody wouldn’t let us win! And I come back to the world and I see all those maggots at the airport, protesting me, spitting. Calling me baby killer and all kinds of vile crap! Who are they to protest me? Who are they? Unless they’ve been me and been there and know what the hell they’re yelling about!

Hell, babe, I was the only one I ever saw spit on a returning vet.

Another manifestation of my “attitude problem”….

mikey

A rule that all things in the universe must follow, called ‘causality’.

The law of the universe should be brought into agreement with God’s law, which is that whoever holds power gets all the credit for anything good that happens, but is in no way responsible for anything bad that may result from his actions.

You may think that this absolves Obama of blame, but he is actually an example of the Lucifer Exception – anyone who tries to take power from those who have traditionally held it is responsible for everything bad that happens anywhere and at any time.

I took Bible logic. I know.

Has everybody seen the Washington Post Editorial Meeting Marshmallow Diorama?

Words of praise cannot do it justice, just come quick, before Jonah beats you to it.

I see our “Carter” still can’t muster up the scrotum to tell the Mad Mullahs to piss off for good.

How is this supposed to work? Are you saying that the president of the United States should tell the leaders of another country to “piss off” from their own nation? I’m sure that will go over big, and be a great help to the people in the street.

The idiots like Twoofy get so much emotional satisfaction themselves by behaving like name-calling empty-threat assholes, they actually think it ought to become our foreign policy.

In a full-scale nuclear laydown on the United States, nothing east of the Mississippi would live and very little to the west of it either.

Oh, I get it now. In the event of a nuclear shelling, the best place to be is obviously on a raft floating right down the middle of the Mighty Missisip.

m13ky said,
“I’m sorry. You’ve got me pretty baffled. Are we still talking about vietnam?
I never saw any hesitation to “return fire”.”

Yes, we are and yes there were rules of engagement set down by McNamara that some people felt unduly restricted their ability to wage war.

… Cam Pha Harbor in North Vietnam. The harbor itself was designated as one of McNamara’s’sanctuaries,’ areas that were supposed to be off-limits for American missions.
…

Absolutely forbidden targets included: any MiG base designated as a sanctuary, a MiG fighter that did not have its landing gear retracted, any MiG fighter not showing hostile intent (no fighter jock ever figured that one out), and any SAM site not in operation. A SAM had to be fired at a U.S. plane before the plane could fire back, a dicey situation at best.

Did the Germans have harbors designated as sanctuaries from which they could shoot down American planes and expect no return fire? Of course not. Maybe it was sheer bureaucratic stupidity, I don’t know. McNamara said he had determined that Vietnam was unwinable in 1965 so maybe they decided to just milk it for as much as they could.

The only point I wanted to make in all this was that I think that at the very highest levels we are dragged into wars not because there is a real threat but simply in order to suck more money out of the US taxpayer. Maybe Vietnam does or doesn’t serve as a good example but our presence in Iraq today does.

Noen,

If I remember correctly these examples you mention were in place to prevent war with China, which had a very real chance of going nuclear. I read that there were many spots that were considered high risk due to Chinese proximity or Chinese advisors in the area.

Admittly, I only know what I have read and have no personal experience, but it makes sense to me….

urdsama said,
The Vietnamese cordially detested the Chinese. North Vietnam was supplied and supported by the Soviet Union. The harbors of North Vietnam could have been mined easily. They were not for fear of escalating the cold war with the USSR. When unopposed resupply was combined with the Vietnamese gift for moving tons of stuff piecemeal the result was a long, futile war on our part.

Here’s a big shocker no wingnut could have predicted. BBC headline:

West ‘seeks Iran disintegration’

Snarla, one of the commenters on Alternet thinks that the protests are a CIA-funded covert op. Sounds kooky, but then the CIA did it for Mossadegh, as well as numerous other nations since, so it’s theoretically possible.

My earnest hope is that if it’s true, they get discovered and every news service from here to the moon gives them a thorough bollicking about it. A good spanking is just what they need.

Come to think of it, one could say that about many people, neh?

Maybe you’re being a tad rough on Aphrodite whatshername.

No less a wingnut dignatory than K-Lo also finks teh Times iz stoopid. And she “Will Fap for Donuts”, in case you didn’t already know.

If it turned out that the CIA had a serious role in the uprising it would be the best thing that could happen to the regime over there. It would probably be a fatal blow for the uprising and that’s why the regime is making these accusations. At the time the of the uprising against Mossadegh the CIA had the run of Tehran and the Shah in its back pocket. They even manipulated the Shia clegy into abandoning Mossadegh. No such conditions exist now and if Kermit Roosevelt and Donald Wilbur had been running around Tehran in the weeks leading up to the uprising they’d be swinging from lampposts right now.

I don’t know where you get your information about vietnam, but I’d suggest you spend some time with a couple vets. ‘Cause one of the problems of that conflict was not an american lack of will to lay down fire…

We dropped more bombs on that country than were are dropped in all of World War II.

I guess a few more million tons would have done the trick eh?

Ahhh good old The Truth… you can always rely on him for an accurate understanding of the broad sweeps of history. Today’s lesson is that Obama standing back and giving Iran space without overt US interference is… just like Jimmy Carter and the Hostage Crisis! However, George W. Bush sending not just a few helicopters, but every single branch of the armed forces, most of their assets, and America’s entire reputation into an Arab country, where Iranian forces from next door proceed to spend what looks like being up to a decade encouraging disaster after disaster for all of America is… nothing like Jimmy Carter but much, much worse at all!

Also!

It is not going to happen, liberals. Your echo chamber is reverberating now with your shouts of victory before you’ve won a single state. I almost feel badly for you, because when McCain wins, your astonishment will be overwhelming. I say “almost” because your ideology is nasty, anti-free speech, and absolutist, and every decent person will sigh in relief when it goes down to defeat once more.

Here is how it will go down next week. First, the results from Virginia and North Carolina will come in, and they’ll be declared for McCain. You’ll be disappointed, but “no big deal, change can’t come overnight” will be your comment. Florida will go red, and a little nervousness will creep in. The usual suspects will fall into the usual categories. As the night drags on, Ohio, Colorado, and (much to your horror) Pennsylvania will be too close to call.

My advice at this point to you will be to go to bed. You will wake up to a McCain presidency and the Great Liberal Freakout will be on.

Bookmark this, liberals, as this is exactly how it is going to go down. You will be wonder how the hell I was able to call this.

Although there’s nothing wrong with looking for evidence of U.S. ‘covert’ foreign policy involvement, it’s not helpful to either (a) begin assuming that anything happening anywhere must be the result of U.S. covert action, or (b) forget that most of the U.S. ‘covert’ actions were never really that covert in the first place, usually being reported on for months by local sources and decent investigators.

usually being reported on for months by local sources and decent investigators.

True, but local sources and decent investigators are drying up faster than the Boston Globe.

Here’s a worthwhile cause every good liberal should get behind. Maybe even a few bad conservatives could support it.

True, but local sources and decent investigators are drying up faster than the Boston Globe.

U.S. ‘covert’ involvement is often as subtle as a small opposition group suddenly having millions of U.S. dollars available to them, or a bunch of obviously American looking guys in sunglasses flying in to drop off loads of weapons.

This wouldn’t include stuff like assassination attempts which are often focused on one person, and that can be kept secret for a while (i.e., the 4 billion attempts to take out Fidel), but larger activities tend to be pretty bleeding obvious.

That, or the U.S. ‘covert’ involvement basically augments domestic right wing and often upper class activities — i.e., in Venezuela there are plenty domestic upper class and right wing opponents to Chavez’ government, and so the U.S. can just aid them.

Gondwanaland Liberation Front!

The Liberation Front of Gondwanaland!

Splitters!!!

Splitters!!!

Hmph.

Oooh! That election prognostication was an utter and complete fail. Every time droolie troll shows up just repost that.

The BBC has had reporters in Iran up until very recently but it wouldn’t even need them to put those accusations by the Foreign Ministry into some critical context. Maybe contrast the Foreign Ministry’s charges with Khatami’s statement over the weekend that it’s a tremendous insult to the protesters to suggest that they’re puppets of Western governments. Sometimes the he said/she said routine makes sense. That’s some lazy ass reporting right there.

Shepard Smith am best ever person at FOXNOOZ, that why Atlas Juggs love him so much!

These positions have hardly endeared him to the conservative base. Mr. Limbaugh criticized Mr. Smith after the e-mail episode; so did Pamela Geller of Atlas Shrugs, who called him a “pompous elitist” and said on the site that he should be fired.

Whatever the criticism from outside, Mr. Smith said that, inside Fox, there is no conflict: “Relations in the building are perfect. Roger is 100 percent supportive.” And he said he continues to be “very happy at Fox.”

Of colleagues like Mr. Beck, Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity, Mr. Smith said, “There’s a lot of money in opinion, and those guys are fascinating, terrific entertainers. This is a news organization. There can’t be a Fox News without news.”

Next up, the Times gets commentary from Pastor Swank on the push to legalize homo nups on a state by state basis. Who says old media companies can’t adapt to the changing marketplace?

He’s a witch! Burn him!

Shepard Smith is just part of their script. “Scene Five: anchor pretends to be an apostate for a few minutes. Viewers awake from their naps.”

Shep Smith – “pompous elitist” from Holly Springs, Mississippi.

I’m sorry for derailing the thread. I didn’t mean to.

There were rails?

Noen,
Don’t apologize too much, at least you were participating in reasoned debate and argueing in what looks like good faith to me.
To continue to derail the thread, the reason, I heard the rules of engagement were in place was to siphon off all of the USSR’s military production. The revisionist histories I read, said we ‘won’ the cold war in Viet Nam by bankrupting the Soviet war machine. Smells fishy to me. I believe I read this theory on Jerry Pournelle’s web site.