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POPSAnyone Remember the Cost of The Wars? Estimates of the true long-term costs of the President's war of choice, including payments of health care and veterans benefits into the distant future, soar into the budgetary stratosphere. They range from the Congressional Budget Office's $1-2 trillion to an estimate by economists Joseph Stiglitz and Linda J. Bilmes of up to $4-5 trillion. So we're talking somewhere between one-and-a-half and seven bailouts-worth of taxpayer dollars flowing into the morass of disaster, corruption, and carnage in Iraq. As Chalmers Johnson, author most recently of Nemesis: The Last Days of the American Republic, the final volume of his Blowback Trilogy, has pointed out for years, the Pentagon, the military-industrial complex, and America's wars are in the process of bankrupting us.
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POPSAfghanistan Looming as Huge Mire of wasted lives, resources When will we ever learn? Trying to bomb these people (at great cost in innocent lives) into submission in a guerrilla war is incredibly stupid. The Russians couldn't do it and apparently we didn't learn our lessons well in Vietnam, Jungle/desert comparison aside. Their will to defend their own turf is rooted in the ages while ours is in greed and misguided ideology and there's the rub. Fools. What a waste of lives and resources and perception of good will worldwide. It's NOT a "good" war, if there are any. And changing strategy to more troops is folly of the worst kind but great for the war profiteers.
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POPSVFP Calls for U.S. Withdrawal From Afghanistan and the Prosecution of Dick Cheney and George Bush fo
This same resolution calls for the U.S. government to provide humanitarian aid to the people of Afghanistan, in non-coercive forms, to help them rebuild their own nation and their lives in cooperation with other nations in the region; and to allow the people of Afghanistan to freely determine their own government without interference by the U.S. "These three statements from our membership represent many of the core values of our organization. We believe that service members have the right to re-evaluate their decision to kill and change their mind. We know that after all the killing is done the individual soldiers must live with themselves and make sense of what they have done. We believe that our political leaders must be held accountable for their actions. This is a critical to a healthy and functional democracy. We realize that to survive the challenges we face today, like global warming, we must find ways to work together and war is not viable." To read full text of the resolu
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POPSRecords show McCain was NO Hero Here's some readin for all you hero worshippers to chew on. See the truth about this war criminal for once. Even as he was bein shot down he made sure he delivered his bombs on the people of Vietnam ...and got a medal for it. urrrrg.
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POPSBush Seeks New Congressional War on Terror Declaration Another attempt by the Bushistas to keep us on a permanent war footing and economy. The War Profiteers no doubt will love this and may have even written it. (I expect Congress to kiss the Preznut's ass again on this) Corporate war crimes are the norm.
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POPSWarning to Obama on the New Cold War by Tom Hayden • McCain has traveled to Georgia, nominated his close friend Saakashlivi for a Nobel Prize in 2005, and was the first American leader to blast Russia last April, when Vladimir Putin issued a sharp warning against NATO membership for Georgia and the Ukraine, supported by the United States. • The Bush Administration was divided along familiar lines, with the foreign policy "realists" around Condoleezza Rice opposite the pro-Georgia hawks centered in Dick Cheney's office and allied with McCain--enthusiasts for spreading "democracy" from Iraq to the Russian border. • Randy Scheunemann, McCain's foreign policy adviser, was a registered foreign agent for Saakashlivi's government from at least 2004, when Saakashvili came to power, until May 15, 2008, when he technically severed his ties to Orion Strategies, his lobbying firm. At that point, Orion had earned at least $800,000 in lobbying fees from Georgia. • Saakashvili, with Scheuneman advising him, campaigned on a platform of taking
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POPSFilm Reveals CIA's 'Most Secret Place on Earth' This film's analysis sets it apart from other books and documentaries on the subject, most of which justify the conflict, lauding the CIA operatives and their Air America pilots as heroes. The reality, as Alfred McCoy says towards the end of the film, was very different. "We destroyed a whole civilisation, we wiped it off the map. We incinerated, atomised human remains in this air war and what happened in the end? We lost." The covert nature of the conflict meant that U.S. forces were able to ignore virtually all the rules of engagement operating in Vietnam. Every building was a potential target and the civilian toll was huge. The situation grew worse in 1970 when U.S. President Nixon authorised massive B-52 bombing strikes on Laos, which remained classified information until many years later. American planes dropped an average of one planeload of bombs on targets in Laos every eight minutes, 24 hours a day for nine years, making it the most heavily bombed country on earth
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POPSMore of the Same, Packaged as Change Barack Obama and Afghanistan Try reading the article to see how insane the Democrats really are (not to mention Replundercans)...More war, more death, more billions wasted....When will they learn that unless they nuke Afghanistan (God forbid but they might!) there is no way to win a war in that rugged (both terrain and people) country. What are they gonna do with all the poppies grown for heroin...are we gonna finance a complete re-planting of hemp or something? Jeebus, this insanity will never stop!
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POPSThis is the Reality of the so-called Surge Success--despair I wonder if 'Merrikans who supported this war and occupation ever really understand what the USA has done to Iraqi PEOPLE? And Afghani People. What a disgrace we are--'Merrikans should be deeply ashamed. Is this what you would call a victorious war that solved anything, Willhelm?
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POPS"President Bush, Will You Please Shut Up Your Oily Mouth?" The neoconned Bush Regime and the Israeli-occupied American media are heading the innocent world toward nuclear war. Back in the Reagan years the National Endowment for Democracy was created as a cold war tool. Today the NED is a neocon-controlled agent for US world hegemony. Its main function is to pour US money and election-rigging into former constituent parts of the Soviet Union in order to ring Russia with American puppet states. The neoconservative Bush Regime used the NED to intervene in Ukrainian and Georgian internal affairs in keeping with the neoconservative plan to establish US-friendly and Russia-hostile political regimes in these two former constituent parts of Russia and the Soviet Union. The NED was also used to dismember the former Yugoslavia with its interventions in Slovakia, Serbia, and Montenegro. Allen Weinstein, who helped draft the legislation establishing NED, told the Washington Post in 1991 that much of what the NED does “today was done covertly 2
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POPSMcCain's Hero Status is Phony McCain's war hero image is fair game and needs to be challenged as well, especially since the Senator beats his chest as the self-appointed arbiter of national military honor and homeland security. The history has been well documented that John McCain received special treatment when he was prisoner of war in Hanoi, in exchange for making over 30 propaganda commercials for the North Vietnamese. In fact, fellow POW's have testified that McCain was considered the best candidate for these films by the North Vietnamese, because he was willing to do anything to avoid torture. They note that the communists even called him "THE SONGBIRD". Ted Sampley, founder of 'Swiftboat Veterans for Truth' and now one of the founders of 'Vietnam Veterans Against John McCain', has stated on their website that even after McCain came home from his captivity he went so far as to deny that MIA's might even still be in Vietnam alive. McCain had the audacity to criticize and ignore the very same people who
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POPSAfghanistan is “becoming a sort of surreal hunting estate" War Gone Bad There is no mystery as to why things have gone increasingly badly for the United States and its allies. As the United States steps up its air war, civilian casualties have climbed steadily over the past two years. Nearly 700 were killed in the first three months of 2008, a major increase over last year. In a recent incident, 47 members of a wedding party were killed in Helmand Province. In a society where clan, tribe, and blood feuds are a part of daily life, that single act sowed a generation of enmity. Anatol Lieven, a professor of war at King’s College London, says that a major impetus behind the growing resistance is anger over the death of family members and neighbors. Lieven says it is as if Afghanistan is “becoming a sort of surreal hunting estate, in which the U.S. and NATO breed the very terrorists they then track down.”
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POPSSome interestin moment at House Hearings on Abuse of Executive Branch Power Miller has introduced legislation calling for appointment of a special prosecutor to bring criminal contempt charges against several current and former Bush administration officials for refusing to comply with congressional subpoenas. The Justice Department has refused to bring charges against administration officials for not complying with the subpoenas once Bush has asserted an executive privilege claim. The House Judiciary Committee has filed a civil lawsuit against the White House Chief of Staff Josh Bolten
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POPS4,000 U.S. Combat Deaths, and Just a Handful of Images The truth hurts, right? See the rest of the story at link. People often forget why we anti-war refuseniks are so adamant--this photo is why. Dead Americans. For What? Oil and bullshit. Lies told by criminal President. It's absolutely disgusting, ain't it?
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POPSGreen ‘Peace Party’ positions against the Iraq and Afghanistan wars compared to pro-occupation Clint “The occupation of Iraq will continue whether a Democrat or a Republican moves into the White House in January 2009,” said Jason Wallace, Green candidate for Congress in Illinois’ 11th District <http://www.electwallace.us> and a member of Iraq Veterans Against the War <http://ivaw.org/index.php>. IVAW has announced ‘Winter Soldier’ (March 13-16), a four-day event bringing together veterans from across the country to testify about their experiences in Iraq and Afghanistan <http://ivaw.org/wintersoldier>. “The ILWU action planned for May 1 is evidence that working people are impatient with vague promises to end these wars. Will Ms. Clinton or Mr. Obama endorse the ILWU protest and pledge to call home all US military personnel immediately?” “By calling the Iraq War a matter of military preparedness and botched strategy, Democrats are sidestepping the premise of the war,” said Bob Kinsey, Green candidate for the US Senate in Colorado <http://www.kinseyforsenate.org>. “While it’s true that
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POPSPelosi should look in the mirror This from the woman who has protected a war criminal who, if Bush is ever tried as one or impeached, ought to be tried and impeached/recalled as an enabler, as harboring, protecting aiding and abetting a war criminal. This from a woman who on occasions has appeared to be lusting over or hero worshipping him. This from a woman who also appears to have had a demented school-girl crush on a virtual monster.
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POPSWar Zero Nothing Honorable About the Vietnam War Between one and two million Vietnamese and 58,000 Americans were sent to their deaths by a succession of presidents and Congresses–fed to the flames of greed, hubris, and stupidity. The event used to justify starting the war–the Tonkin Gulf “incident”–never happened. The Vietnam War’s ideological foundation, the mantra cited to keep it going, was disproved after we lost. No Southeast Asian “dominos” fell to communism. To the contrary, the effect of the U.S. withdrawal was increased stability. When genocide broke out in neighboring Cambodia in the late 1970s, it was not the U.S., but a unified Vietnamese army–the evil communists–who stopped it. Not even General Wesley Clark, shot four times in Vietnam, is allowed to question the McCain-as-war-hero narrative. “Well, I don’t think riding in a fighter plane and getting shot down is a qualification to be president,” he argued. The Obama campaign, which sells its surrogates down the river with alarming regularity, promptly hung the former
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