“Oil Prices Will Soar if Iran Goes Through with Threat.” When I checked my email this morning, I saw this headline on Yahoo!
There you go. You need to understand how bad it will be for YOU if the United States doesn’t attack Iran. The war industry is alive and well, and now that Obama “ended the war in Iraq,” which I prefer to refer as getting tossed out, we have to have a new villain. I understand that people claim that the “combat” mission was over, but I keep getting hung up on the fact that US troops were being killed, and were killing other people is not considered “combat.” I wonder if you told an 18 or 19-year-old kid sitting in the desert with live ammunition flying over his head, or holding a fellow soldier as they died, if they thought they were engaging in combat, how they would respond. Don’t worry though about the mental anguish that might cause, because they are probably a member of the National Guard, and we don’t have to absorb the medical expenses for them when they get home…that’s only for active duty. Whew!! That means we have more money to buy missiles! Those things are expensive, and to make sure we are getting rock bottom prices on them, we not only send National Guard units on several tours in the Middle East, we also just pay whatever Boeing tells us they cost! You couldn’t get away with that if it weren’t for the “free-market!”
If you were unaware, Boeing happens to have lowered their labor expense by moving their operations from Washington to South Carolina, because the stupid workers in Washington kept striking…I’m sure it was just because they were lazy, not because Boeing was treating them unfairly. You do not have to worry about having that on your conscience, because when the NLRB tried to look into the matter, the GOP immediately decided to try to abolish the agency that just wastes government money looking out for lazy workers, who are trying to screw over the “job creators.” We are going to all be thanking them, because Boeing may have just forfeited the fucking insane profits they make (even prior to moving to SC,) and packed up the teepee, due to regulations making it just too tough to do business in this country. I mean they already have to do nothing to get the contracts, why are they going to put up with being required to treat workers fairly, just to bet billions of tax payer dollars? Ayn Rand warned us with her “philosophy,” that the “job creators” will just pack up and stop saving our society by raping the treasury and exploiting labor in the name of massive profits, if we don’t let them do whatever they want. Ayn O’Connor, which is the name she used to get Medicare and Social Security, knew that government programs were only for parasites, and that if you didn’t inherit your wealth, as she did, you were not worth spitting on.
I am sure that anybody who has the good fortune of reading this will be relieved to know that the tax dollars that funnel into companies like Boeing will stand no risk of going towards dirty socialist programs like universal healthcare, which is a terrible idea. Why the hell should you not work like a dog, for a barely livable wage, and get to escape paying exorbitant healthcare costs? Why shouldn’t small businesses struggle to stay open for attempting to provide benefits for their workers? The “free-market” is absolutely going to do its best to make sure that you maintain your freedom to go bankrupt if you choose to get cancer. If you fail at life and get sick, you will still have the freedom to lose everything that you saved up until that point, and even be free to lose your home.
Recently, I was having a discussion about my disappointment with President Obama with somebody that I have a great amount of respect for, and who is about as good of a source for political information as anybody you are going to meet (seriously.) At one point I countered the “he ended the war in Iraq” with my personal take on the situation, and the conversation momentarily devolved into, “If you don’t like Obama, President Romney is going to take us to war with Iran.” I have a few problems with that… First, if I criticize the policies of President Obama, I am not pro-Romney, Paul, Santorum (shudder,) or any of the other wingnut GOP candidates. Second, if you think that being pro-Obama is being anti-war with Iran…you’re nuts.
Going with the “if you don’t love everything that Obama does, that means you are going to vote for a Republican” idea, allow me to make a quick aside, for the “I am going to vote for Ron Paul because he wants to end the wars” crowd. If you think that Ron Paul is a savior of some sort, you are crazy. If you think that Ron Paul would really not go to war with Iran…you’re crazy. If you think that Ron Paul is really looking to legalize marijuana because he is “on the level,” you’re crazy. If you think that there is even the slightest chance that life in this country would improve, even a little bit, for any of us other than the very wealthiest white people…you’re crazy. The good news is that if you feel any of those things, you match your candidate, because he is fucking crazy. It is sad testimony to the state of American politics to think that there are people contemplating a Ron Paul presidency. The man is insane, and just hates the Federal Government. As I was told on Twitter, when I said that voting for Paul out of disillusion with Obama showed an flawed comprehension of our political system, “I understand the political system, IT’S CORRUPT.” If you get some water in your gas tank, do you crush your car? Our political system has worked before, and federalism has served us fairly well. I admit we hit a snag here and there, but it is not the system, it is the people in the system.
I have already said that I have my issues with some of Obama’s policies, but if the election was tomorrow, which would really piss off the TV networks, because they still need to make billions of dollars on negative, slimy, batshit commercials, which are made with every intention of fooling non-informed voters into thinking that their candidate gives a flying shit about you…and of course the other candidate hates your freedom, man! Ok…sorry…back to if the election was tomorrow: I would vote for Obama. Of course after I did that I would feel relieved that my “once every four years” civic duty was done, and I could retire to my couch and make all kinds of cynical remarks about “lesser of two evils” etc. I mean the guy said change…I took 15 minutes out of my life to vote for him**, so now I want my damned change.
Sitting on my couch and waiting for some change from any elected official is an exercise in futility, yet for the past three years, many have done just that. Expecting that I am doing my part to prevent a war in Iran by voting for Obama is equally nuts. War with Iran is coming folks. Go ahead and mark that down. There will be no candidate on the ballot, who is going to have the guts, or an actual desire, to stop it. It is part of our vision. We’ll be told that oil will go up, and we’ll be told of the horrible government that is oppressing people needs to be overthrown. There is going to be a connection to 9/11…because that will resonate, and we should just expect one of those to drum up support for war on brown people from now on. Yellow ribbons, “Let’s Roll” license plates, “support the troops” signs will come out of storage and go back on sale. Toby Keith will put a boot up absolutely nobody’s ass, but he will make a pile of cash singing about it. The guys in the white hats (that’s us,) will defeat the guy’s in the black hats (that’s them,) and “God Bless America” will now be played during the 3rd and 8th inning at baseball games…unless we decide to get together as a society and force our government to hear the voice of the people. Before we are able to do that, it would help if “the people” knew the truth about all US military intervention since WWII. It will be called unpatriotic by cowardly commentators like Bill O’Reilly who would piss himself 5 seconds after landing in Iraq. It will be a really complicated issue, one that you just can’t understand because you’re not an expert. It will be everything that every other one of our imperialist conquests have been, unless we stop it.
Can we stop it? I know that we can’t stop anything if we don’t try. You miss 100% of the goals you don’t shoot at. This war wouldn’t be for democracy, freedom, or concern over your fuel prices. It will be about what they’re all about…private interests and war-time profiteers. Everything else we so smugly call collateral damage.
Rant over, thanks for listening.
**Note on voting time: I happen to live in a primarily white suburb in Pennsylvania, so we so not have long lines at the polls. We have tons of voting machines and nobody busts my rocks over my ID. There is a friendly, all white, staff to answer any questions that I may have… I can also probably score a Romney/Pawlenty pin on the way in, from one of the unemployed workers, who lost a job to outsourcing, but is so scared that the “God-damned socialist muslim Obama” wants to take his hunting rifle. If he is out of pins, not to worry, he can run to his pick ‘em up truck, which is held together by McCain/Palin stickers, and grab some more. More on this guy in later posts. As much as it sounds like I have disdain for him…I don’t. I love him, like I love everybody, and we just need to have a talk…we’ll get to is soon.
