By the Sword

Allow the President to invade a neighboring nation, whenever he shall deem it necessary to repel an invasion, and you allow him to do so, whenever he may choose to say he deems it necessary for such a purpose -- and you allow him to make war at pleasure. If today, he should choose to say he thinks it necessary to invade Canada, to prevent the British from invading us, how could you stop him? You may say to him, 'I see no probability of the British invading us' but he will say to you, 'Be silent; I see it, if you don't.'" -

- Abraham Lincoln
















Never think that war, no matter how necessary, nor how justified, is not a crime.

- Ernest Hemingway






Naturally, the common people don't want war ... but after all it is the leaders of a country who determine the policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in every country.

- Hermann Goering





I don't see how you can lead this country to succeed in Iraq if you say wrong war, wrong time, wrong place. What message does that send our troops? What message does that send to our allies? What message does that send the Iraqis?

-George W. Bush







Words quail. Simple phrases and clauses cannot describe the
human suffering, the waves of devestation that flow outward
from each little disaster, that forms the cataclysm, the violent
and explosive rent in the fabric of reason, that is war.

















Let us never forget, though, that there are two wars being waged in the word today, by the USA. One is the war that was brought to our doorstep
by Islamic extremists who longed to pull the US of A into a protracted
and bloody war on their own ground, so that they could finally bring the spotlight of the international media to their theater of complaint--

The United States of America responded to this attack vociferously and justly. This is the war that is being waged in Afghanistan, and in Indonesia, and in other parts of the world, today, over four years after the 9/11 attacks.

And then, there is that other war--the War in Iraq--the one that turned International opinion against the Bush Administration. The war that so bitterly divides American domestic discourse. The war that the media focuses on, relegating the War on Terror and the men and women who fight it to "oh, yeah, by the way," status.

This is Mr. Bush's war, the vendettas of the father taken up by the son, the war he blindly and deafly pressed upon a nation, never let us forget, largely and vocally against its coming.
















I would say to all the young republicans out there who still adamantly refuse to see that the emperor has no clothes, that the Bush regime's legacy will be one of a failed foreign policy that will haunt several of his successors.

Now, we are confronted by an upheavel in the country's domestic policy that matches what the the million mistakes in Iraq have cost the US; 23 million illegal aliens that the country is helpless either to deport or assimilate, who intend to put America over a barrel. The ever-nebulous Bush seems eager to cave in to this extortion; The has also quite clearly articulated that all that he has wrought wil be left at the feet of his successors, whoever they might be.

In a three more years, then, Bush will wash his hands and walk away;

but this leaves one hard fact, disturbingly clear; the Bush legacy is one of strife, of need, of betrayal of values, and of human pain, and it is one that will endure long after this administration is fading, dusty history.






God created Arrakis to train the faithful.
--from "The Wisdom of Muad'Dib" by the Princess Irulan

--George Herbert, Dune.