Wonkette
ABOUT THAT TERRIBLE THING THAT OBAMA IS DOING: We’ve had this question for approximately six to eight months but keep forgetting to post about it, because more important things like teabaggers and birthers and deathers and Meghan McCain and Chuck Grassley’s Twitter must be attended to with haste, at all times. So. Question: Why is Obama maintaining a lawless secret detention center (Bagram) that’s potentially worse than Guantanamo Bay? WAIT — SECOND QUESTION: Why is Obama restarting a war in Afghanistan? Just those two things. Now, back to the usual smut. [ABC News]
My God! A serious post! Jim: What’s got into ya?
A (for both questions): Because Hillary “Henry Kissenger” Clinton asked nicely?
Obama wants a steady supply of top-grade hashish from Afghanistan in the White House.
Uh, the war never ended; we just fought it in a really half-assed way for seven years. There are worse things than a full-on war: never-ending, endemic warfare. If you’re going to fight, you should fight like hell and get the damned thing over with. Anyway, that war made sense (unlike Iraq), and still does. The root cause of 9/11, the London bombings, the Madrid bombings, the Bali bombings, etc., is nutball Wahhabi jihadism. The Taliban were the only country ruled by nutball Wahhabi jihadists (they don’t actually run Saudi Arabia, they’re just the official church, and as a coopted established church, they’re not particularly revolutionary). The smart thing to do, which seems to be happening finally, is to bribe every Afghan who can be bribed into snitching on or fighting the al Qaeda types, and SHOOT THE REST. Most Afghans hate those fuckers, as do the Pakistanis, and the sooner we get medieval on their medieval asses, the better off people in Afghanistan and Pakistan will be.
There’s nothing unconstitutional about bombing a country that someone else invaded.
I have it on good authority that Grassley likes to rub one out while looking at corn smut.
Lazy Media: In the name of Jim Webb I salute you
ALSO - there’s nothing like some hott war on war action to distract the wingnuts from healthcare
BAGRAM AND AFGHANISTAN ARE RESEARCH FOR THE FEMA CAMPS AND DEATH PANELS WHEREIN WILL BE PUT THE ENEMIES FROM THE ENEMIES LIST AS DOCUMENTED BY THE POLITICO ON THE INTERNET. I HAVE LINKS THAT CAN PROVE THIS. WE MUST WATER THAT LIBERTY TREE SOON AS DROUGHT CONDITIONS PREVAIL. ALSO, WE SHOULD THINK ABOUT PRUNING THE SHRUB OF SOCIALISM.
Only Nixon could go to China, only Obama can ‘win’ in Afghanistan, and only Bush could choke on a pretzel. And Reagan. And Ford. Goddammit, modern Republicans are some stupid, evil fucks.
It is, Jim, a question worth debating, but if you should discover that Meghan McCain is getting boned by some big biker dude I expect you to get back into Wonkette mode toute de suite, and the tooter the sweeter.
That Bagram thing is seriously troublesome.
Its the NWO, Jim! Don’t you SEEEEEEEEE!?! He keeps the base open because of the elites! And the war because Cash4Gold is making MONIEZZZ!
WAIT - THIRD QUESTION: what does any of this have to do with chickens and Kenya?
Bagram is nothing like Guatanomo, which holds “terrorists.”
Bangram simply holds and tortures regular people planning to vote for Karzai, whilst we institute a better, more responsive puppet government. You are welcome, fledgling democracy.
I think both policies are dreadful but not surprising. Obama campaigned on escalating in Afghanistan. And when you’re in a war you have to keep the POWs somewhere.
Fox n Fiends: There’s nothing like some hott health care reform to distract libtards from institutionalized torture and endless war.
*sigh*
Y’know, it seems like Justice, the CIA and the DoD are riddled with moles that Cheney, Rumsfeld and maybe Dubya burrowed in to non-appointed positions so they could continue their policies after Obama’s inauguration. What other reason would there be for DoJ to continue prosecuting absolutely innocent people for terrorism charges and for Bagram and warrantless wiretapping and other barabarities to continue? I think it’s time for a purge — root out the evil for good.
Larry Fine: Bingo. Or something like that. Afghanistan is primarily known for what crop? Is it rutabagas?
My little brother is in the 173 Air Brigade Combat Team. They drive around the countryside in M Wraps (some kinda bombproof truck) waiting for someone to shoot at them, THEN THEY FUCK THEM UP and send the survivors to Bagram or whatever.
Kid seems to enjoy what he does, for the most part. I have mixed feelings about it.
:-\
I’m just throwing it out there but I think he’s decorating it and when he’s done, he’ll give each and every wonkette member a cell of his/her own. also.
orange: Didn’t the NWO get bought out by the WWF, or was that NWA? I forget…
ragepotato: No misspelled words. No inappropriate punctuation. Wingnut fail.
Lazy Media: The smart thing to do, which seems to be happening finally, is to bribe every Afghan who can be bribed into snitching on or fighting the al Qaeda types…. Yes. And we do not need to use the US Army to take over the Afghanistan in order to do this. After we supported the Taliban in the Afghan war against Russia, why don’t we have any of their people on the payroll? This mystifies me and I am stumped. So I come to Wonkette for snark.
Sounds like someone is angling for a place on BO’s enemies list…
If Dubya had just treated these guys as POWs under the Geneva Conventions, Gitmo and Bagram would not be an issue. A few “rights” and Red Cross/Crescent visits, and we’re in compliance with international law, which allows for the trial of war criminals and their long-term imprisionment. But, no, Dick Cheney wanted to watch torture porn videos instead.
4tehlulz: They’re all in an umbrella organization run by some Jooish cabal, I believe.
Well, the best place to hide those FEMA death camps from FOX News, talk radio, and the right-wing bloggers is a warzone (at least now that Geraldo is no longer allowed near our troops).
Lazy Media: No one’s ever won a war in Afghanistan except Afghans. This war could last forever and could be Obama’s Vietnam. I don’t know the solution but I’m sure it’s not trying to win a war in Afghanistan.
SayItWithWookies: This assumes that key Obama people disagree with what W & friends were doing. Which is turning out to not necessarily be a correct assumption.
gurukalehuru:”THE TOOTER THE SWEETER” carmel apple empanada shot out my nose.
Because if Obama doesn’t fight in Afghanistan, the terrorist win.
Jim, are you suggesting that Obama should eat a Bagram of lightly salted poison rat dicks?
We’re so good at outsourcing, why don’t we outsource this to MI6? We pay, they do the work and keep us in the dark. Isn’t that how elitists handle things?
“I say, dear boy, mighten we clean up that mess in Afghanistan for the lads in the U.S.? Money is no object for them in spite of how they talk about recessions and depressions. They just want all that unpleasantness off their televisions and we could make a tidy profit in the offing.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bagram_Theater_Internment_Facility
Judge John Bates’ 04/2009 decision (Maqaleh v. Gates ) mentioned in the wiki article extends the writ of habeas corpus to only to three men — a Tunisian and two Yemenis — who were transported to Bagram after being captured elsewhere. The decision doesn’t apply to prisoners captured in Afghanistan.
hobospacejunkie: We should bomb Taliban hide-outs in Cambodia. Secretly.
Sussemilch: Precedent is a great American tradition, after all.
Cicada: Cue Keystone Kops theme music and roll film, bitches!
Obama needs to do something super cool soon. His presidency has been a letdown so far. The alternative would have been a huge clusterfuck, but I didn’t vote for him so I could say “At least McCain isn’t the president” for the next four to eight years.
S.Luggo: Negroponte, please.
Aurelio: We didn’t bribe the Taliban against the Russians. We had nothing to do with the foreign Arab jihadists, who were the backbone of the Taliban movement. The mujahedeen we supported were the Aghan warlords who later became the Northern Alliance (most of ‘em, anyway; some turned Taliban because that’s the way the wind was blowing). The Arab jihadists like bin Laden had a separate war going alongside ours; we didn’t give them anything, and there was great mutual distrust during the war against the Russians. Their funding came from the Saudis, and the Saudi money stuck around after the Russians left (unlike ours).
See “Charlie Wilson’s War” for details. Or “Red Dawn.” I mix those up sometimes.
” Question: Why is Obama maintaining a lawless secret detention center…”
Because ha can?
Pardon the interruption. We now return to our regular Wonkette:
http://www.style.com/vogue/feature/2009/08/jenny-sanford/
Thank you Jenny Sanford!
Pardon my lack of levity, but I’m probably going to be visiting the fair city of Kabul for 6-12 months, around the end of 2012, if things don’t DRASTICALLY improve in the meantime. So, fight, fight, fight, and get it over with before then. I’ve done two wars out of the reserves; I’m not anxious for the trifecta.
Come here a minute: Tits of GTFO
Obama is doing these terrible things overseas because there are teabaggers with AR-15s outside his townhalls who preserve liberty domestically. Duh!
hobospacejunkie[/re]: Alexander the Great successfully pacified Afghanistan (actually, just the Kyber pass) by marrying his officers off to the daughters of the tribal chieftains which would suggest the perpetual bribe thing is probably worth a try.
As for why we need Bagram…don’t be coy, We all know something will “have to be done” about all those contards running loose with tri-corner hats and assault rifles before we can get the Death Panels organized and pulling plugs for the glory of our Dear Leader (comrade mullah Obama).Bagrham is sufficiently remote and unpleasant to insure we don’t get any embed requests from Fox news.
John Stewart is likely to remain problematic, though.
hobospacejunkie: Yeah, but as in Iraq, we have to do a lot of inflating of the balloon to get OUR Afghans up to speed on the fightin’ front. At least Afghanistan is naturally one country; they don’t have a built-in secessionist war the way Iraq does. If Iraq were a single society, we’d have BEATEN that insurgency, so there goes your theory that modern armies can’t beat patriotic guerillas. The difference there is that the civil war is liable to bust out as soon as we leave, even though the insurgents have been crushed.
Afghans are hard-asses, but they’ve never fought anybody with the technological disparity we’ve got. As soon as all the MRAPs get transferred from Iraq, you’ll see the IED fatalities drop the way they have in Iraq. Afghanistan could be Obama’s Vietnam and nobody would notice that much; if we’d had modern body armor and vehicles in Vietnam, we’d have lost 5,000 guys instead of 50,000, and South Vietnam might be who makes our cars. Of course, there will be a SHITLOAD of maimed and psychologically crippled dudes, but that doesn’t make the nightly news.
Lazy Media: I know the war never ended, silly. “Restarted” was me being an asshole with words!
But happy killing.
Jim Newell: Sucks to be me. Killing people is no fun, even if you only do it indirectly, with teh words.
Possiblity #1) The Pentagon not Obama is really in charge.
Possiblity #2) These things take time. Erik Prince, the NJ Rabbis. It is all adding up to the erosion of the Bush coalition. Now if they get something on Rev Hagee, and some defence contractors. That will take a lot of the profit out of the war. Once that happens maybe it will end. I noticed at military.com they are looking to reduce the number of NCOs.
BTW, look who is still in the news. And top shelf coverage too.
Orly Taitz: Obama policies are ‘clear and present danger to Israel’
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1108110.html
Lazy Media: (most of ‘em, anyway; some turned Taliban because that’s the way the wind was blowing).
So why didn’t we put some shills among these people and put them on the payroll?
Lazy Media:Besides, we did support the Taliban.
Ahmed Rashid, a leading author and expert on Afghan affairs, said it was “clear” Washington, which armed and trained the Afghan mujahedin during their battle against Soviet invaders in the 1980s, indirectly supported the Taliban.
“The United States encouraged Saudi Arabia and Pakistan to support the Taliban, certainly right up to their advance on Kabul” on September 26, 1996, he said from his base in Lahore, Pakistan. “That seems very ironic now.” — Phillip Knightley, The Guardian 10-8-01
Source: http://www.rense.com/general14/rise.htm
Aurelio: Because George H W Bush was in charge? And lots of stupids going on?
Ahmed Rashid is talking out his ass. Saudi Arabia and Pakistan had their own agenda, which was not supported (or paid much attention to) by the Clinton State Department except that it might lead to less fighting. We quit caring once the Soviets were gone, and pretty much ignored what the Saudis/Pakistanis were doing. In ‘96, we were focused on the Balkans, and Afghanistan had receded back to its status as a place you shouldn’t write editorials about (because of its irrelevance).
Wait a second, are we back to the usual smut yet?
Mebbe Bagram is where Obama hides Dennis’ Dept. Of Peace?
They won’t let cameras in there - right?
As we all know, Ike’s “military industrial complex” runs this country.
Prezdints are just there to take abuse.
Lazy Media: I didn’t say modern armies can’t beat patriotic guerillas. I said no major power has ever won a war in/with Afghanistan. And the US ain’t gonna be the first.
There’s an awful lot of apologism from just about one individual going around, here. It’s pretty silly if you ask me, and it needs to stop.
Because Obama is a slicker, less religious, version of Bush! Com’on, naive Obama-worshippers, he’s a product of Chicago politics!! He probably threatens disobedient Dems with cells at Bagram! (Too bad he doesn’t send Bush et al there.)
Aurelio: Dried fruit, before the Russian invasion.
Jukesgrrl: Because Britain has lost every invasion of Afghanistan, sometimes in spectacular fashion. Read George MacDonald Fraser’s _Flashman_ for a colorful account.