Letters to the Editor
Riversofexile
Published Letters: 76
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Thanks, Calbears
[Read the article: National Review reporter caught fabricating; where is the "liberal media"?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]for articulating this, it bears emphasizing:
Anti-Arab sentiment is bipartisan, unexamined because it is justified and righteously so by pro-Israeli partisans who seek to block any criticism of Israeli policies and U.S. support for those policies, and here's the kicker largely "liberal" in its origins. Democrats, not Republicans, for most of Israel's history, have been Israel's main backers. It's only been recently, mainly under the current Republican administration with the rise of evangelical Christian political lobbying, that the Republicans have become more zealous for Israeli occupation, than the Democrats.
Unfortunately, up until within the last few years, the "left" in the US, while completely aware of this dynamic and the anti-Arab politics on which it rests, kept quiet out of fear of alienating its "Jewish" constituency, even as that constituency was always more divided over Israeli policies than it appeared to its gentile colleagues.
Given what has gone down in the past seven years, I'm now of the opinion that the US "left" - or its Establishment media and politicos - shares those prejudiced views. Silence = assent, or something like that.
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what is "Arabism"?
[Read the article: National Review reporter caught fabricating; where is the "liberal media"?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here][...]the support for anti-Arabism is bipartisan [...]
ondelette
I know "specialists of the Arab world" (lol) at State and elsewhere are referred to as "Arabists". Whatever, lazy language. But that doesn't tell me what "Arabism" is, let alone what its "anti" or the "support" it gets are.
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ondelette
[Read the article: National Review reporter caught fabricating; where is the "liberal media"?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]no need to apologize, I worry sometimes that we hesitate to call things what they are.
Me - this is plain old prejudice - anti-Arab/Muslim in this case.
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Exactly right, once again
[Read the article: Our serious foreign policy geniuses strike again]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Yup, that's correct - these fools made monstrous errors, the consequences of which have been incalculable suffering and despair for thousands of innocent people who never wished us any harm. That's right.
Yet, there they are, still in their respective positions - reporting BS, agitating for more conflict, more killing, abusing superior minds such as El Baradei's - dude is an Arab/Muslim anyway, who can trust what he has to say - circling back to that overt prejudice we were talking about just yesterday.
Here we are, once again, lamenting it all, with no apparent means for us to change a damn thing about it. By "us", we're talking the majority in this country that believes we've been lied to, and manipulated to an unprecedented extent to go commit crimes, yes, crimes - there is no other word for what we have been doing.
As if to continue to set the dictatorship tone - a big "fuck you all" to all of us, here we have Wolfowitz (!!!) being rehabilitated back into State as "Arms Control Advisor", no less. In what real democracy does this sort of thing happen?
I mean, this class of people seems to get bolder every day, they feel they can (and do) get away with any old BS, over and over and over again. There is never any price to pay, just like in any miserable dictatorship, they are immovable. All we , the people, can do is moan and basically gossip about it, just like in any miserable dictatorship.
I sincerely want to hear from lawyers or any other relevant profession. Tell us, please, how do we go about reversing this situation, what tools are available to us, please, tell us. There's got to be something people of good will can do. After all, this is supposed to be a d.e.m.o.c.r.a.c.y.
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factions operating secretely in gvt
[Read the article: Our serious foreign policy geniuses strike again]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]What's interesting, and even encouraging, about the NIE release is that there is evidently a substantial faction inside the intelligence agencies and the military that has so far managed to leak and foot-drag the war party to a standstill. hquain
I find no comfort in the notion that there are "faction(s) inside the intelligence agencies and the military" working against the civilian leadership - for any reason.
We, the people, should have been able to relieve them from a rotten leadership, so they could continue to simply serve the nation unencumbered by politics or having to make their own unvetted decisions.
Yes, this "faction" seems - this time - to want to oppose another unnecessary war, but all this says is that we civilians have lost control of OUR war-making apparatus. I cannot simply rely on secret operations among insider factions making all the decisions, especially when it comes to war and death.
I want this crap all out, I want hearings in Congress, I want prosecutions, I want justice done. I want transparent, determined national action and resolve.
Is this too much to ask?
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kitt
[Read the article: Our serious foreign policy geniuses strike again]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Talk about low expectations:
The release of the truthful information about Iran that is contrary to what the Bush administration are their MSM enablers have been screaming about and writing about didn't just happen for no reason. I'd be interested to learn the who's and how's of how it happened that the truth finally made it to the fore. This is way beyond "lamenting". This is a major success. kitt
So now, it's a "major success" when folks do their job, and when those in gvt say the "truth" - well, today's "truth" anyway.
You seem to associate yourself with whoever this is that is telling us today's "truth", even as you admit not knowing who they are or what their motives are. Neither you nor I, as citizens, have been involved in any part of what you describe as a "major success", yet we are supposed to take some sort of credit for it? Which part of it?
Did past lamenting work, is that why the NIE is telling us today's "truth"?
Or did the military/intelligence apparatus realize the citizenry has effectively been muzzled, and the system corrupted enough that they had to finally step up instead, knowing that there is no way we come out on top if we make a stupid move against Iran?