Amy Goodman: The Obscenity of War

[Echo In Light]

President Barack Obama has just returned from his first trip as commander in chief to Afghanistan. The U.S.-led invasion and occupation of that country are now in their ninth year, amid increasing comparisons to Vietnam.

Daniel Ellsberg, whom Henry Kissinger once called "the most dangerous man in America," leaked the Pentagon Papers in 1971. Ellsberg, who was a top Pentagon analyst, photocopied this secret, 7,000-page history of the U.S. role in Vietnam and released it to the press, helping to end the Vietnam War.

"President Obama is taking every symbolic step he can to nominate this as Obama's war," Ellsberg told me recently. He cites the "Eikenberry memos," written by U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan Karl Eikenberry, which were leaked, then printed last January by The New York Times.

Ellsberg said: "Eikenberry's cables read like a summary of the Pentagon Papers of Afghanistan. ... Just change the place names from ‘Saigon' to ‘Kabul' ... and they read almost exactly the same."

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/03/31

[Echo In Light]

1. Bump

[Moochy]

2. Choice McChrystal Quote

The Eikenberry memos recommend policies opposite those of Gens. David Petraeus and Stanley McChrystal, who advocated for the surge and a counterinsurgency campaign in Afghanistan. Eikenberry wrote that President Hamid Karzai is "not an adequate strategic partner," and that "sending additional forces will delay the day when Afghans will take over, and make it difficult, if not impossible, to bring our people home on a reasonable timetable." Petraeus and McChrystal prevailed. The military will launch a major campaign in June in Afghanistan's second-largest city, Kandahar. Meanwhile, with shocking candor, McChrystal said in a video conference this week, regarding the number of civilians killed by the U.S. military, "We have shot an amazing number of people, but to my knowledge, none has ever proven to be a threat." U.S. troop fatalities, meanwhile, are occurring now at twice the rate of one year ago.

Worth restating: We are losing more soldiers at a faster rate, double the rate of last year.

Cue the Pro War Pep Squad.

[Echo In Light]

3. A grim, revealing quote, to be sure

[Moochy]

4. This thread needs more kicks

Perhaps we should start a fight over semantics in this subthread. :shrug:

[Echo In Light]

18. lol...no kidding. Weird, eh? ...anti-war thread @DU gets an astounding 13 recs

[Moochy]

21. MLK on the USA

"the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today"

a speech given one year before his assassination.

[court jester]

5. Plenty of room for Amy under the all new Bus

Cause it's a WaterBus.
a Patriot one week and the bus the next








Lots of stuff is confusing

[Moochy]

7. She's been under the bus since she started

[Echo In Light]

8. Too "loony" lefty for moderates/cons, too 'gatekeeper' for others lol

[EFerrari]

17. I've been saving a place for her.

lol

:kick:

[Moochy]

19. I think she should just broadcast from down there

She could interview all the other great Democrats who are down here.

[G_j]

6. big K&R!

:applause:

[Echo In Light]

9. Bump

[backtoblue]

10. kicked

interesting and thought-provoking article

[Echo In Light]

11. Bump

[Eyerish]

12. K&R

[PufPuf23]

13. Yes War is obscene

and the effects are not seen enough in our media.

[tekisui]

14. knr.

[EFerrari]

15. Kick

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

16. "Just change the place names from ‘Saigon' to ‘Kabul'" Yep. LBJ redux. K&R

[Echo In Light]

20. Bump

[Moochy]

22. k&r

for the nite shift :kick:

[L0oniX]

23. K & R

[unhappycamper]

24. k&r

[Kitty Herder]

25. K&R

[Echo In Light]

26. Bump

[Echo In Light]

27. Bump