Yesterday morning as I was trying to get my shit together and get out the door, I caught a few minutes of that bastion of morning teevee Urinalism, “The Today Show.” It was that part in the beginning where they spend about five minutes on “real news” before moving on to more important things like how many chicks Tiger Woods is banging on the side or the cross on Moses the cow’s forehead (which isn’t really a cross, but, whatever). I could tell it was the serious news part because they had serious news person Andrea Mitchell (who always reminds me of Katherine Helmond in “Brazil”) on. Andrea was reporting on climate change and Global Warming. Well, not really. She was reporting on a “feud” between Al Gore and the Wolf Killa from Wasilla, Sarah Palin, over the op-ed piece that Sarah signed her name to in the Washington Post the other day. Al pointed out how stupid Global Warming deniers are, and Palin responded with a series of snotty Facebook posts that Mitchell read on the air. Yes, that’s what journalism has become – they don’t even have to be stenographers anymore, they just pull up Facebook and read what’s there. Rather than, oh, I dunno, maybe doing some reporting on whether or not the vast majority of scientists believe that climate change is both real and man made, her report basically consisted of “Gore said, ‘Yes it is.’ Palin responded with, ‘No it isn’t.’ Gore: ‘Uh-huh.’ Palin: ‘Nuh-uh.'” It’s shit like this that (almost) makes me glad I have to go to work in the morning.

I’m reluctant to mention this sports-related item but, what the hell: Nine-and-oh, baby!

Matt Taibbi has an interesting article up at Rolling Stone, entitled “Obama’s Big Sellout.”

Barack Obama ran for president as a man of the people, standing up to Wall Street as the global economy melted down in that fateful fall of 2008. He pushed a tax plan to soak the rich, ripped NAFTA for hurting the middle class and tore into John McCain for supporting a bankruptcy bill that sided with wealthy bankers “at the expense of hardworking Americans.”
[…]
Then he got elected.

What’s taken place in the year since Obama won the presidency has turned out to be one of the most dramatic political about-faces in our history. …Obama had a clear mandate to rein in Wall Street and remake the entire structure of the American economy. What he did instead was…[pack] the key economic positions in his White House with the very people who caused the crisis in the first place. This new team of bubble-fattened ex-bankers and laissez-faire intellectuals then proceeded to sell us all out, instituting a massive, trickle-up bailout and systematically gutting regulatory reform from the inside.

But, hey, he accepted a Nobel Peace Prize by saying that the US has a right to kick ass anytime, anywhere, no matter what – you gotta give him credit for that. He’ll be out there “clearing brush” at his ranch in Chicago before you know it.

Speaking of “War is Peace,” “Escalation is Withdrawal,” “Obama is Change,” and stuff, Harry Reid says no “Public Option” is better than the “Public Option” (that was never really an option). Not that it matters, since Queen Olympia Snowe and King Joey Lieberman will never let the Medicare buy-in (which, while it’s pretty crappy in that you can’t buy into it unless you can’t get insurance through your employer and is gonna be more expensive than private insurance, apparently isn’t crappy enough for the Connecticut Crybaby) happen.

Speaking of Lieberman, break out those Dreidels, ‘cuz Chanukah begins at sundown tonight (which is what, about 3:00 these days?). Chappy Chanukah to all the Jewish folks out there. Keep your N’er Tamid trimmed and burnin’.

Today, President Obama goes to Oslo to accept the Nobel Peace Prize, just nine days after announcing the escalation of the war in Afghanistan and several days spent by members of his administration adamantly declaring that when he said we would begin withdrawing troops in 2011, it didn’t mean that we’d be withdrawing troops in 2011. What’s next? A posthumous Lifetime Achievement award for Stalin? Obama will reportedly be met by a few thousand ant-war protesters when he arrives (ironic, to be sure), so naturally he’s decided to piss off the Norwegians by blowing off lunch with the King. Oh, sure, you’ll bow to the Japanese, but you’re too good to sit down for a bowl of Fiskesuppe with King Harald? What? A little too white for you? Nice way to thank them for the $16 million they’re spending on security for your trip (that’s, like 92 million Kroners, which would buy helluva lot of Carlsbergs).

Alyssa Milano is “giving up” her 37th birthday to draw attention to the lack of clean drinking water in many parts of the world (I know what you’re thinking: “holy shit, she’s 37? Damn, I feel old”). A noble cause, Alyssa, but I think you need something bigger. I’m thinking some sort of PETA-like ad with you and water. I have several ideas. Perhaps we could make this a joint venture. Have your people call my people, and maybe we can work something out.

There appears to have been a “breakthrough” in Senate health care reform negotiations last night, with whatever they concocted being sent to the CBO for “scoring.” Details are sketchy, but it appears the new plan will cover people whose injuries are related to cheating on their supermodel spouses, as well as mothers who give birth to six or more consecutive children within a 24-hour period (the children themselves, however, will not be covered). As a trade off designed to gain support of conservatives and right-to-lifers, any medical procedure involving a woman’s hoo-hoo (defined as the area between knees and navel) may not be covered by any plan that receives federal funding (except for c-sections, which will be free as long as they’re scheduled at least two weeks in advance, and take place during normal business hours).

Also, the female hoo-hoo shall be stricken from the curriculum of any medical college that receives federal funding, since knowledge of that area is thought to encourage promiscuous behavior. As a nod to the ladies, new breast implants will now be covered, with a $75 co-pay. Women with existing implants will also be eligible for a replacement set, provided they’re trading up at least one cup size. This will be covered by a new fee imposed on breast reduction surgery.

As a concession to male Republicans and Joe Lieberman, prescriptions for erectile dysfunction medications will be required to be covered with no co-pay up to 62 doses per month (though patients can request a rather ironically named “hardship exemption,” good for an additional 30 pills in any month where they can prove travel out of the country to Haiti, the Dominican Republic or Bangkok). This so-called “Viagara” amendment will be paid for by a 300% tax on condoms and 750% surcharge on birth control pills, diaphragms, spermicidal jelly, IUDs, and Mifepristone. A Senator closely involved in the negotiations is quoted as saying,

“I’ve got a smile on my face. I don’t smile naturally.”

Apparently that’s not the only thing he no longer comes by naturally.

In more important news, however, our snow drought appears to have ended at day 287; there are a couple of inches of snow in my back yard, and the news crawl is full of school closings and delays. We’re supposed to get six inches or so by mid-morning (not a lot by our standards – and certainly nothing like the folks out there in the Midwest are having to deal with, but since this is the first significant accumulation in 288 days, it’s nice to see). I think it’s all sitting on a coat of ice, too, so it ought to be slow going on the way to work this morning (might take me four minutes instead of two). Sadly, the snow is going to turn to sleet and then rain, so by the time I get out of work, the snow will all be gone. Never fear, though; this was just a little bit to prime the pump, and more snow’s a comin’ later in the week.

Oh well, time to get out there and try and get over the hump.

Just as people of a certain generation will never forget where they were on yesterday’s date in 1941, and those of another generation will always remember where they were on November 22, 1963, I will forever recall vividly where I was 29 years ago tonight. Ronald Reagan had been elected President about a month earlier, defeating Jimmy Carter in a landslide, thanks, in large part, to the fact that something like 70 Americans were into their 13th month as hostages in Iran, and the Soviets seemed to be poised to invade Poland. It was a Monday night, and I was a college junior in my dorm room at SUNY Oswego. A couple of my friends were down in the lounge watching Monday Night Football, but it was a crappy game between the Patriots and the Dolphins that I wasn’t much interested in. So, instead, I was in bed with the lights out, taking a little toke, and listening to the radio – WCMF from Rochester, which was a really good station back in those days. The DJ broke in at some point with the news that John Lennon had been shot in New York City, and a few minutes later – just before 11:00 PM – he had to choke back tears as he announced that John had died of gunshot wounds. Stunned, I walked down to the lounge and told the people watching the game that John Lennon had been shot to death. A few moments later, Howard Cosell announced it to the football-watching world, and I went back to my room to listen to a constant stream of Lennon songs that would continue over the next few days.

I don’t think I can adequately express how I felt (how we all felt). Everything about it really sucked. It would have sucked if he’d died in a car accident or a plane crash or even a heroin overdose, but that somebody who wrote songs about peace had been murdered so young and so violently was stunning. I mean, who didn’t love John Lennon (Nixon, Hoover, Haleman and Erlichman)? And after taking a few years off to be a dad, here he was back again, having just released Double Fantasy, which, if you ignored the Yoko tracks, had some great music on it, and he was already in the rehearsal stage for his next album – Milk and Honey. Suddenly he was gone. Some deranged asshole had done what Nixon never could – silence John Lennon’s voice forever.

If there is a God and God lets shit like this happen, then God’s a dick.

But time marches on, and now it’s almost 30 years later. We never did manage to give peace a chance, did we?

I had a totally new experience yesterday. Normally, I shun all interaction with humans. This is why I use the self-checkout whenever it’s available, buy shit online if I can, and drive miles out of my way to avoid 4-way stop signs. I make certain allowances at the dog park because I’m a good dad and will do what I have to for the sake of my boys (plus, other than the Frisbee golfers, the folks at the park are dog people, so they’re mostly OK), but that’s about it. Yesterday, though, at the crack of eight (I’d have been there earlier, but they don’t open ’til 8:00 on Sundays), I went to Home Depot and asked for help. Okay, I guess that’s stretching it a bit. I was walking around looking confused and hostile (confused, because that’s my normal look, and hostile – what Granny calls my “Klingon Look” – in order to discourage people from talking to me) while trying to find something, when one of the Depot Dudes came up and asked me if I needed help, and – here’s the kicker – I said “yeah.” And he actually helped me!

Emboldened by my success, I asked him where I might find something else – and he helped me yet again! I was in and out in record time. In fact, I was kind of meandering aimlessly about the store for a while, trying to figure out what I forgot, ‘cuz I was done so fast. I know this probably sounds trivial to you, but to me, this was stunning. I imagine this must be similar to what happens when you ask somebody for directions (though obviously my Garmin nüvi is a far superior alternative). Oh, sure, I’ve had my wife go get help (she was born rather lacking in the patience department, and will stoop to asking for help at the drop of a hat), but I usually go and hide while she’s doing it, so as not to be exposed to her shame and humiliation, and this is the first time I experienced it directly. Oddly, it wasn’t all that bad. Not that I plan on ever doing it again, of course, and it’s not something I’m proud of, but I reckon it’s good to humble yourself occasionally. Let’s you see how the other half lives. Hell, maybe I’ll even read the directions for the new microwave. Nah.

The only mention of what happened 68 years ago today was that one of the local high school marching bands was going to be honored for having an undefeated season (bands have wins?) as part of “Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day,” and then a quick 60 second segment of black and white stock footage of ships engulfed in smoke and flames. I’m not sure what the two things have to do with each other (congrats to the B’ville Bees Band, though), but doesn’t Pearl Harbor rate something a little more than that? I mean, I was just looking on the CNN and CBS news websites, and there isn’t even a mention (not on their front pages, anyway), though MSNBC at least has something.

For those of you too young to remember (or too young to remember anybody who remembers), more than 2,200 people – sailors, mostly – died on a day that thrust us into a war on both hemispheres simultaneously, and we didn’t abandon the Constitution. Well, except for that whole Japanese internment stuff, but at least they didn’t lock them up and torture them (that we know of), and anyway, in 1988 Ronnie Raygun officially said, “sorry about that.” Unlike people today, folks back then didn’t whine and mope about, blathering mindlessly about how “everything changed,” either, and FDR didn’t tell them to go shopping – he told them to get off their asses and either enlist or buy War Bonds and start crankin’ out ships, tanks, and airplanes. Everything from sugar and gas to butter, rubber, and nylon was rationed for the war effort.

Buy shit? Hell, no, just the opposite. Stop buying shit, ‘cuz we need it “over there!” And by God (who was still alive back then), the people went out and did it – cranking out something like 300,000 airplanes, 85,000 tanks, 30 aircraft carriers (2 “large” ones), 8 battleships, 350 destroyers, and 200 submarines (not to mention a couple of atomic bombs). And people who tried to profit from the war were sent to prison like the criminals they were.

I always thought it was kind of silly that people denounce it for being a “sneak attack,” as if blowing up a couple thousand people would’ve been OK if they’d just sent us a telegram or something first:

COMING TO ATTACK YOUR NAVAL FLEET STOP SHOULD BE THERE EARLY MORNING ON THE SEVENTH IF WEATHER IS OK STOP HAVE A NICE DAY, IMPERIALIST PIGS STOP PS - YOU SUCK STOP

Oh, I guess you’re supposed to declare war first and all that. Play by the rules and whatnot. But where would the fun be in that? Hell, we don’t even bother to declare war anymore (though we do make sure the “news” organizations get advance notice so they don’t miss any photo ops), and we attack with un-manned drones (flown from right here in Syracuse, even). Can’t get much sneakier than that.

Today is also, ironically, my Father-In-Law’s 88th birthday (not that he was at Pearl Harbor; he was busy celebrating his 20th birthday by trying not to get shot himself, having had the honor of serving the Fatherland in the Kriegsmarine for several years already). Happy Birthday, Opa!

On Press the Meat today, it’s Secretary’s Day, with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Secretary of Defense, Bob Gates. Also up, Saint John McCain, and a roundtable with former journalist Bob Woodward and Tom “my head is flat” Friedman.

Secretary’s Day continues on CBS as Bob and Hill hop on over to Faze the Nation.

At Fux News Sunday, Weaselface Wallace has Gen George Betrayus, plus Dick Durbin, John “corn hole” Cornyn, the fuxheads, and “Power Player of the Week,” George Stevens Jr., Producer of the Kennedy Center Honors.

We get back to the Secretary’s Day celebration on the Goebbels Network, as George Snufalufagus hosts Hill and Bob, plus Russ Feingold and a roundtable with George :jerk: Will, Piggy Peggy Noonan, Dick Haass and Katrina vanden Heuvel.

On CNN, Fareed Zakaria hosts Richard Holbrooke, President Obama’s Special Representative to the Afghanistan/Pakistan region, flathead Thomas Friedman, and former head of the IAEA, Mohamed ElBaradei.

Have a good Sunday.

Well, it didn’t take long for officials in the Obama administration to “clarify” that whole “withdrawal” thing. SecDef Bob Gates says “…plans to begin withdrawing American troops in July 2011 are definite, yet flexible….” Ah, definite yet flexible. I like that. My pillow is firm, yet soft. My sponge is damp, yet dry. Not quite Rumsfeldian, but close. SecState Hillary Clinton calls it a a “real target for us to aim at.” Well, glad to hear we have a real target to aim at. National Security Adviser Jim Jones (there’s a name that inspires confidence, eh?) is a bit more clear: “…this is not a withdrawal of the United States from Afghanistan in 2011…. [I]n no manner, shape or form is the United States leaving Afghanistan in 2011.” Well, alrightly then. Sounds like “withdrawing from Afghanistan” is the equivalent of “health care reform.”

It’s “Free Form Friday” on the local “Classic Rock” station today (as it is every Friday). This means that, instead of the DJs playing the same old shit they play every day, people call in and request the same old shit the DJs play every day. “Um, can you play ‘Stairway to Heaven? I aint heard that since ‘Get the Led Out’ on Wednesday.” Personally, I’d like to call in and request ‘Working Class Hero’ (though that might be more appropriate as a Monday song), but since they play the sanitized “funky kicks” version of ‘Jet Airliner’ and the censored, “who the…are you?” version of ‘Who Are You,’ I think they might balk at “…keep you doped with religion and sex and TV, you think you’re so clever and classless and free, but you’re still fucking peasants as far as I can see.” After all, that’s not very Christmassy, is it?

Speaking of X-mas, last night the First Family lit the National Christmas Tree (that’s right, “Christmas Tree” – contrary to the bogus e-mails claiming that the Obamas would be calling them “holiday” trees) in an invitation-only event (more or less), kicking off the rather ironically named month-long “Pageant of Peace.” Well, the President is a Nobel Peace Prize winner, after all. The best thing about the National Christmas Tree is that it’s alive and well – nobody had to go out and murder a beautiful old tree. I’ve always found the whole Times Square tree thing grotesque. They make a big deal of hauling this poor dead tree in on a flatbed truck – like a deer strapped to the roof of a station wagon or something. They ought to go out and gut one of our State Senators, shove a light bulb up his ass, and use him as a tree topper.

But, whatever. Despite the lack of snow (we’ve now gone 283 days w/o getting an inch of snow, which is really quite amazing), I guess there’s no escaping the fact that the Christmas Season is upon us (whether we want it or not). I choose to more or less ignore it as much as I can. I quit with the cards last year (talk about a waste of trees), and I don’t really have anybody to shop for (kitchen appliances are my gift to the house this year), so there’s not much for me to do except wait for the Twilight Zone Marathon on New Year’s. I really can’t get away from it at work, though. Christ (so to speak), some of these people are awfully gung-ho with their collections for families and toys for tots and everything. Not that those aren’t good causes, of course, and I admire their dedication, but, well, I guess the part of me that gives a shit about Christmas probably died with my mother 10 years ago. Not that I’m a “bah humbug” kinda guy – I try not to step on anybody’s holiday buzz or anything. But my emotions are invested in more important stuff at this time of year – SU basketball (which, so far, is going pretty OK).

Speaking of important shit, the Today Show’s top story was the impending verdict in the Amanda Knox murder trial in Italy. This somehow managed to beat out Day 5 (or whatever it is) of the Tiger Woods saga, the tree-lighting ceremony, and the White House party crashers (funny how Republicans – after weeks of “watering the tree of liberty with the blood of tyrants” and adding fuel to the “Obama aint a legit President” fire are now suddenly concerned with the President’s safety, refusing to accept the fact that, no matter what else, it’s the Secret Service’s job to keep the crazy people away from the President – not the White House Social Secretary). They did, eventually, get around to mentioning the minor story of the attack this morning on a mosque in Pakistan that killed at least 40 people.

You have to give the Salahi’s credit for getting the attention they so coveted (and I don’t see why they should face any criminal charges – no matter how embarrassed anybody is over it; I mean, if I walk up to the White House and say, “I’m here for the party,” and they say, “oh, right this way,” well, good for me, I guess). You’d have to be living in a cave not to have heard their names at this point.

Speaking of living in a cave, that’s exactly what two brothers – Zsolt and Geza Peladi – have been doing. The boys had been down on their luck, living in a cave outside of Budapest, and selling junk on the street in order to feed themselves. Their fortunes have changed, though, as it turns out they are two of three long-lost relatives who will share a $7 billion (with a ‘b’) inheritance. The best part? Women. According to the 43-yr old Geza:

“If this all works out it will certainly make up for the life we have had until now — all we really had was each other — no women would look at us living in a cave. But with money, maybe we can find a partner and finally have a normal life.”

Oh, no worries there, Geza; I think you fellas are all set with the ladies now. Might I suggest a certain Swedish supermodel in Florida? I think she may soon be available. Two words of advice, though: get a pre-nup, and hide the 9-iron.

Well, I guess it’s that time again. Have a good one.

I finally got around to watching Phil Donahue and Ellen Spiro’s movie “Body of War,” about a 25-yr old kid named Thomas Young who enlisted in the Army to root out the evil-doers in Afghanistan, was sent to Iraq instead, and, on his fifth day there, was packed into an uncovered and unarmored vehicle with a bunch of other young men so they could be used as AK-47 target practice for insurgents. Kinda like shootin’ fish in a barrel (or wolves from a helicopter). Thomas was shot below the collar bone, his spinal cord was severed around mid-chest or so, and his life was destroyed. He can’t cough, can’t regulate his own body temperature (he has to wear a vest filled with ice packs that he adds or removes like thermal ballast as required), can piss to some extent, but not enough to empty his bladder, so he needs a catheter inserted a few times a day, lest the leftover urine crystallize and lead to urinary tract infections, which he’s prone to), can’t walk of course, spontaneously craps himself, and is for the most part incapable of having sex with his pretty young wife. As the film follows Young through a life filled with pain, massive amounts of prescription drugs, and the eventually dissolution of his marriage, it cuts to speeches from Republicans and Democrats alike spewing the same bullshit propaganda about WMD, mushroom clouds, and “national security” that we all knew at the time (and since been proven) to be lies.

I hadn’t thought this shit could still move me, but there I was, on the verge of tears over what this kid has to deal with for what’s left of his life (having to instruct his mother on how to insert a catheter into his penis is just one indignity he was forced to endure – on camera), enraged by these piece of shit “representatives” who paved the way for Bush, Cheney, and Rumsfeld to send them there, and proud of Robert Byrd, Teddy Kennedy, and the other 21 Senators (21 + 2 = 23, for those who are checking my math) and 133 Representatives who had the courage to vote “no” just three weeks before election day, 2002. And here we are, seven years, more than 4,000 dead and some 200,000 Thomas Young’s later. After Vietnam, I never thought we’d be stupid enough to fall for it again, but here we are. And what really enrages me is that Barack Obama is doing the same goddamn thing in escalating whatever it is we’re calling this folly in Afghanistan. Maybe the 30 years between Vietnam and Iraq dulled our senses and blurred our vision, but there’s no excuse for Afghanistan. It’s clear, it’s obvious, and it’s shameful.

And the expendable cogs in the machine like Thomas Young will continue to have their lives blown to pieces so profits can be maximized, and politicians can prove how tough they are by sending other people’s kids off to die in our names.

Speaking of shameful, as Sue mentioned yesterday, the NY State Senate had a vote on legislation to legalize gay marriage. It had already passed rather handily in the NY State Assembly, had the support of our Governor, and had already passed a state constitutional test, in as much as the NYS Court of Appeals ruled that same sex marriage was OK – as soon as it was enacted into law. So if the Senate passed it, then gay NYers would have had the same rights (at least as far as marriage and what it entails) as everybody else. In the debate leading up to the vote, no Republicans spoke, and, predictably, all Republicans voted “no.” The Republicans were joined by 8 Democrats (my State Senator voted “yes,” I’m proud to say), and the bill failed 24-38. None of this is particularly surprising, but it’s still disappointing.

Speaking of disappointment, I was supposed to get my new refrigerator yesterday, with the old one being relegated to “beverage fridge” in the basement. I was looking forward to stocking it up, and then getting a big funnel for the floor drain so I’d never have to go upstairs again. Alas, Sears had other plans for me. They brought my new stove and “microhood,” but no fridge. It seems their “system” never kicked off the part that tells the warehouse to actually ship the goddamn thing to me. Because, supposedly, my credit card was never charged. So the only way to get it back into the “system” was to charge it again. Except I checked my statement online, and guess what? They did charge it. Just cancel the second charge, right? Oh, no, can’t do that. I had to go in with receipt and get the original one credited. And they can’t deliver the damn thing until after Christmas now. I was a little peeved, to say the least, but, whattya gonna do? You can’t fight the “system.”

Speaking of the system, time to get ready to go and be a good little cog in it.

Oh, and Happy Birthday to my big sister. Hard to believe you’re 29 already.

Great news from the President last night: we’re absolutely, positively, sure-as-shit getting the hell out of Afghanistan. And, as Phil Collins once sang, “we’ve gotta get in to get out.” So, time for 30,000 more of our friends, neighbors, sons, and daughters to get in. Not all of them will be getting out, unfortunately, but if you wanna make an omelet, you gotta break a few eggs, right? Lots of these expendable eggs will be coming from my neck of the woods – Fort Drum, which is about an hour north of me in the now infamous NY 23rd District (not sure if Doug Hoffman knows that or not). Ft. Drum is the home of the 10th Mountain Division (which had the honor of being the “most deployed” army division of the 1990s, and has endured multiple deployments and suffered large numbers of casualties in “Operation Enduring Freedom”), whose mission it is to train to fight in terrain like Afghanistan (not that Watertown, NY is exactly Afghanistan, but it’s pretty rural, gets damn cold in the winter, and has lots of trees and mountains (not exactly the Rockies, of course, but having humped a camping backpack up and down them myself, I’d just as soon not have to carry 120 lbs of military equipment around in them – especially if people were shooting at me). But at least we a have a firm deadline of July 2011 for withdrawal. Well, not a deadline, really. More like a “goal.” And, of course, it’s “tied to events on the ground.” And there’s no actual defined number of troops that will begin withdrawing in 2011. But we’ll pull out in time – “honest, honey.”

After all, as the President pointed out, the number of troops in Afghanistan has paled in comparison to the number in Iraq. So, we need to even all that out. Oh, I suppose we could do that by pulling our guys and gals out of Iraq instead of sending more of them off to die in Afghanistan, but that wouldn’t have been very manly, and Republicans would’ve taunted the President mercilessly. Not now, though – just ask Karl Rove, who said he’d be:

“among the first to stand up and applaud” the President for a troop increase.

Or Michael Steele:

…I am glad the president will finally provide General McChrystal with the troops he needs

Hey, if geniuses like Karl Rove and Michael Steele think this is a good thing, it must be. Mustn’t it?

Oh, sure, surrender monkeys like Russ Feingold and Dennis Kucinich aren’t happy, but those guys are always going on about stupid shit like peace and universal health care and whatnot.

As many Obama true believers have pointed out, this decision was “very hard,” and you certainly can’t argue with that. Our last great War President told us being the preznit was “hard work,” after all, and it was one of the few things he ever said that had the ring of truth to it.

For me, though, President Obama’s new master plan for Afghanistan evokes the words of the last generation’s great American War President, Lyndon Johnson, who, in 1966 (when there were “only” 200,000 US troops in Vietnam) said:

Some people ask if we are caught in a blind escalation of force that is pulling us headlong toward a wider war that no one wants. The answer—again—is a simple no…. There is not, and there will not be, a mindless escalation.

Amen, and “…God Bless you, God Bless our troops, and may God Bless the United States of America.”