Marine Gen. Smedley Butler - a two-time Medal of Honor winner - once said that:
"War is a racket. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives."
The current "Commander in Chief" - elected on promises of hope and improvement in the daily lives of the little people - isn't helping things any. Despite his new weapons procurement bill signed today, can an honest person really expect that anything significant is going to change? The entire Congress passed this bill unanimously, so you know that there is fresh rat in the vat. We can't cease producing a military budget which is almost itself larger than the combined military expenditures of the entire rest of the world, can we? It's for the national defense! It would hurt the bottom line not to defend the nation!
No significant change will occur as long as this nation - founded on furthering graft and corruption in avoidance of government regulation - continues to follow its historical precedents. It will still be expected of the working class to rescue - with their diminishing stock of hard-earned dollars - the executive class who made such a horrible economic mess of things. The working class will in turn continue to receive additional cuts in jobs, wages, and benefits - along with the growing tax bill - as the wealthy take from the poor to give to the rich. That's robbery! But it's for the national defense!
Gen. Butler also had something to say about this:
“I spent 33 years in the Marines. Most of my time being a high-class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer for capitalism.”
We can readily see that the capitalist racketeers will only bestow any largess upon themselves. How much did Bernie Madoff give to you? But the American people will be told all weekend by FOX and CNN and MSNBC (the morning portion) to feel proud of our war dead, that they were helping buy with their lives a successful economic effort to make the world safe for American-led multinational corporations. Forget that these companies - whose products the American people will soon not be able themselves to afford to buy - aren't about to share the swag with he who has borne the battle! Forget that the swag itself used to belong to the nations who now send their impoverished citizens to attack us any way they can anywhere they can. Suicide is painless compared to living in impoverished wage slavery! Just keep sending more Americans to die for corporate profits! God will sort them all out, right?
Article comments
1 - m a r k
This article belongs 'above the fold'. Good work.
2 - Doug Hunter
For someone who obviously 'cares' so much, I look forward to your complimentary article 'Who remembers the greatest genocides in history, 100 million dead, and a Gulag for your thoughts?(The deadly and violent history of oppression from the left and the douchebags who ignorantly still support it)'
3 - ma r k
'Complimentary'? I think you mean 'non-sequiturial' or some such.
4 - Doug Hunter
|/ /- |? |<
I think it would make a great companion piece.
5 - Doug Hunter
Screw escaping mechanisms.
6 - roger nowosielski
What are you bitching about, Doug?
7 - Doug Hunter
Life is too easy and I have nothing better to do. Also, I made a nice rendition of mark's name rife with special characters that wasn't able to make it through legibly.
8 - Dave Nalle
Some of this article actually makes a great deal of sense, but why is it so long and why does it cover so many topics? Seriously, it would be far more effective broken down into 3 or more clear and succinct topical articles.
Dave
9 - roger nowosielski
Whatever. As long as it doesn't deteriorate to a dragged-out fight of the kind we had yesterday on Glenn's thread. The contestants were virtually at each other's throat.
10 - roger nowosielski
Well, Dave - shouldn't the editor take a lead role here?
11 - Bliffle
Good article. Well written, entertaining and captivating.
Whether one agrees or disagrees with Realist you have to admit he made his points forcefully and backed them up with solid citations.
One can only hope that the comments will be as literate.
12 - Baronius
Wow, if General Butler is telling the truth, then Realist broke the story that the Spanish-American War was corrupt!
13 - Dave Nalle
Baronius, I'm pretty sure the Rickover commission covered that ground thoroughly back in 1974.
Dave
14 - Ruvy
So long as you guys remember your war dead by grilling hotdogs instead of visiting soldiers' graves, being porked and spitted like hotdogs by the corporate pigs grilling you will be what you deserve.
I couldn't quite follow this particular rant (I just got up), but if you guys are buying bullets from Israel, you can't be doing too bad. I just hope your currency holds up long enough to pay for them!