Don’t Ask Don’t Tell

Q: Why are Democrats and Republicans fighting so hard over the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell?

1. Opposing it’s repeal gives Republicans their bonafides.
2. Supporting it’s repeal gives Democrats their bonafides.
3. Opposing it’s repeal delivers votes to Republicans.
4. Supporting it’s repeal delivers votes to Democrats.
5. Supporting it’s repeal delivers LGBT money to Democrats.
6. Opposing it’s repeal brings fundie money to Republicans
7. Because it’s oh so good for both parties at election time.

January 27, 2010  State of the Union speech.

September 21, CNN —

White House ‘disappointed’ with vote on ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’

The White House is “disappointed” at the Senate vote blocking the repeal of the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, “but we’ll keep trying,” spokesman Robert Gibbs said Tuesday.

September 23, CNN —

White House objects to ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ injunction

Obama administration objects to federal judge issuing injunction to stop implementation of “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy after her ruling that it was unconstitutional. The government argues the proposed injunction is “untenable,” too wide in scope and would cause harm to the military.

September 23.  Google search on Don’t Ask Don’t Tell unequivocally illuminates the president’s position on DADT.

Q: When will Don’t Ask Don’t Tell finally be resolved?

1. When pigs fly.
2. When a snowball is crowned prom king in hell.
3. When Obama passes a lie detector test.
4. When Dick Cheney tells us what really happened on 9/11.
5. When Nancy Pelosi falls out of love with Obama.
6. When Chris Matthews falls out of love with Obama.
7. The sun will come out tomorrow; bet your bottom dollar that the sun will come out, tomorrow.

The Red Ass

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cross-posted at Lightpond

Different General, Same War! And Obama Still Smokes!

This is a bad news, bad news joke.

The bad news:  General McChrystal is out, but the occupation of Afghanistan goes on .

Obama and McChrystal

Obama says the general’s ill-advised remarks to Rolling Stone Magazine, demeaning the White House leadership, undermined trust and respect for civilian command of the military.

Obama said the decision doesn’t reflect a difference over war policy. He said the controversy over the remarks “undermines civilian control of the military” and makes it more difficult to achieve U.S. objectives in Afghanistan.

I don’t understand why Obama selected McChrystal in the first place.  He  apparently had a well-known  reputation for insularity and single-minded resistance to opposing views. From CommonDreams:

In an interview with IPS, one military source who knows McChrystal and his staff described a “very tight” inner circle of about eight people which “does everything together, including getting drunk”.

“McChrystal surrounded himself with yes men,” said another source who has interacted with some of those in the inner circle. “When people have challenged the conventional wisdom, he’s had them booted out,” the source said.

And there were other troubling issues.  From Democratic Underground:

Pulitzer prize-winning American investigative journalist, Seymour Hersh, said that there is a special unit called the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) that does high-value targeting of men that are known to be involved in anti-American activities, or are believed to be planning such activities. According to Hersh, the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) was headed by former US vice president Dick Cheney and the former head of JSOC, Lieutenant General Stanley McChrystal who has just been named the new commander in charge of the war in Afghanistan.

On July 22, 2006, Human Rights Watch issued a report titled “No blood, no foul” about American torture practices at three facilities in Iraq. One of them was Camp Nama, which was operated by the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), under the direction of then Major General Stanley McChrystal.

Oh, wait.  Maybe that’s why McChrystal was chosen:  He had unconstitutional proclivities, just like is bosses:  “High value targeting” and mass killing with drones.

Now the other bad news:

General Patraeus will continue the fiasco.

And Obama still smokes!

Obama smokes!

PSSST…Liz Cheney Likes Torture

torture 6

According to Liz and Dick, America can’t be safe unless it can torture at will.  Torture is good for America.  It’s the one government job Republicans don’t want to export. Are they pissed off because Obama has the foresight to keep a campaign promise and fob it off on our allies, the Egyptians and Saudi Arabians? If Liz and Dick are so proud of what he did why did they burn the session tapes? Isn’t prosecution a small price to pay for saving America?

Suffice it to say Liz is a dope. Jeb Bush/Liz Cheney in 2012, anyone?

See Liz Run

Torture 2

The Cheneys and their organization “Keep America Safe” insist “enhanced interrogation” isn’t torture.  What goes on in CIA jails and dungeons is no more unpleasant than a Skull and Bones hazing. Water boarding is no worse than an extended tea party at the bottom of the swimming pool. It’s a three minute dip. Anyone can hold his breath that long. Abu Zabaydah did it 186 times and lived (for Cheney to tell about it).  I wonder if Liz would like to give it a try at Democratic Party headquarters. A psychologist, a physician and an Indian chief will be present in case things go too far. Former Bush Attorney, John Yoo, will provide a memo if things do.

Salon says:

torture 5

In other words, bye-bye, Bill of Rights. This is a prescription for a police state, where not just the police but the Army can kick your door down without a warrant or probable cause, as long as the president says he’s fighting “terror.” If Barack Obama had solicited such an opinion from an obliging Justice Department lawyer because he wanted to sic the U.S. Army on a group of domestic terrorists, the right would be screaming about jackbooted federal thugs descending from black helicopters to haul off American citizens. Strangely, no conservatives have taken to the streets to warn us of the Big Government danger posed by this radical doctrine. Perhaps they are too busy mobilizing against the unspeakable socialist menace represented by Obama’s 3 percent increase in taxes on millionaires.

torture 1

The only trouble is some people (the losers), such as the Japanese, have been hanged for it, if they did it to Americans. Here’s a visual history of the violent sport of water-boarding.   From the Medieval Dominican monks torturing heretics to American imperialists torturing Filipinos, every group deploying the technique has justified it as absolutely necessary to preserve or protect whatever they claimed needed preserving or protecting. Every State torturer says it is entitled to every tool at its disposal. The Nazis used that argument at Nuremburg, the furtherance of State interests.   Most, but not all, torture in secret, not only to protect their identities from future retribution, but to create State terror. That’s (one reason)why it’s banned.

torture 4

And it’s not just water boarding.  It’s every horror known to man. As soon as water boarding is commonly believed to be NOT torture, nothing will be. As soon as it’s alright to break a foreign “terrorist” on the rack, “enemies domestic” won’t be far behind.

torture 3

No, Nancy, Not You, Too!

Dick Cheney

According to Dick Cheney (so don’t go gettin’ your hopes up) Nancy Pelosi was briefly briefed on what everyone in Washington, (at least the culpable parties) wants to call Enhanced Interrogation Techniques, EITs.  EITs don’t sound so bad to me, maybe like scrawling a bunch of sentences with a crayon or standing in a corner with  gum on your nose.  Maybe a head first dunk in the tub a hundred and eighty-two times or so if you’re named Abu Zubaida, or Abu anything.

Cheney”s legal boobies said EIT does not include waterboarding (they had promised Nancy over a bag of hot chili cheetos).  Nope, it doesn’t.

Nancy, sweating heavily beneath her Halston pantsuit,  says she didn’t know about the EIT part of waterboarding.  I believe her.  Her friend and fellow multi-millionaire, Diane Feinstein, (who I would have no good reason to doubt)  vouched for Nancy’s character and honesty this way:

“I’ve known Nancy a long time,” Feinstein said. “We lived a few mansions houses apart for couple of decades. I’ve never known her not to be truthful cause even my best friends at Abu Ghraib couldn’t  get it out of her. Let me put that on the record.”

Nancy at secret meeting

Fess up everyone. What’s the difference if you did or you didn’t?  Nobody got hurt and Obambam says it happened too long ago yesterday.  Besides, lying makes you look so ugly,errr like EITs are being used on you when you’re standing in front of the television cameras.  Nancy, have you seen yourself lately? I know, point at Dick.  Cheney’s ugly too.  But Monsieur Le VeePee is naturally ugly-stick ugly. You, not so much.

We can still be friends.  Nothing is so terrible that a loving and forgiving American people cannot forget.