FUCK YOU WALMART Part Two

Again, Just cut and paste, otherwise I will sink into nothing more then a ranting lunatic.

From http://welcome-to-pottersville.blogspot.com/
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I wonder if Hillary still cuts any ice with Wal-Mart’s board of directors?

Yeah, I’m in the zone and am chomping at the bit to type up what little of my novel I had time to write at work today but then I came across this story and was reminded once again that virtually everything in the world is more important than my rock-n-roll novel.

Debbie Shank is a sterling example.

In my three plus years as a political/social blogger, I’ve read and have written about some incredibly outrageous stories that had tempted me to try to alter my DNA so I could no longer be considered human even at the genetic level. Because what Wal-Mart is doing to this family, one that seems to attract tragedy like a magnet attracts iron filings, makes me ashamed to be a terrestrial human.

I’ll give you the abstracts:

Debbie Shank, former Wal-Mart employee, was hit by a semi eight years ago. To this day, she has no short term memory, is incapacitated and will live in a nursing home for the rest of her life. Her husband, just recovering from prostate cancer, has to work two jobs to pay for her medical costs.

Or, should I say her ex-husband, because he divorced her just so she could get more disability benefits.

When Debbie was almost killed by that semi, Wal-Mart’s health insurance paid the medical bills promptly. However, what they didn’t go out of their way to tell Debbie when she first signed on for that coverage was that the company (a self-insured entity, in case you’ve yet to come to that conclusion) reserves the right to recoup all the medical bill money if they receive a settlement, which in this case was $417,000.

When Wal-Mart got wind of it, they immediately sued the Shanks for that amount plus $51,739, making nearly $470,000 in all. The trust fund opened for Debbie now contains roughly $277,000, far short of the money Wal-Mart, which pulled down $90,000,000,000 (that’s ninety billion) in retail sales in their last quarter alone, is trying to squeeze out of them. In fact, Wikinvest states that Wal-Mart’s annual revenue, based on the 2008 fiscal year, would place it in the world’s top 25 nations’ GDP.

If Mr. Shank were to somehow magically pull the other $200,000 out of his ass, not only would the family be broke and unable to pay Debbie’s medical expenses, their 17 year-old son wouldn’t be able to go to college.

Oh, and a year and a half ago their 18 year-old son Jeremy was killed serving in Iraq.

But the law is the law, Wal-Mart’s flaks keep saying, so that means we can and should completely fuck over this tragic family.

Here’s an article from the St. Louis Dispatch. I’ll save you the time in case you’re pressed for it: The 8th Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the family’s appeal to overturn the lower court’s decision. A week ago, the right wing, pro-corporation Supreme Court refused to even hear the case without deigning to give an explanation.

If you shop at Wal-Mart, stop. Stop now. Stop bloating these already bloated Bentonville fucks and running buddies of Hillary Clinton and email them, call them, voicemail then, fax them and otherwise tell them why you will no longer shop there. It’ll mean supporting your local economy and merchants but oh well, sacrifices will have to be made. If you’re hurting as much as the Shanks, which is impossible for me to imagine, then compromise and shop at K-Mart.

It’s not very often that even Wal-Mart makes me madder than the GOP (although there may not be a difference) but do not let them maintain this sickeningly cloying and incredibly dishonest PR campaign that bills them as a family-oriented company. Let them know you’re onto them, let them know that you know about what they’re doing to the Shanks and let them know why they’re losing your business (Why stop at costing them $470,000?).

(I can’t find an embed code for this video (the only one on Youtube is for some reason unavailable) but this link will take you to the original CNN.com video.)

FUCK YOU WALMART, JUST FUCK YOU!!!

I just don't have words for this, I just am finished, really.
Fuck these people and their shoddy crappy two-bit products!
From crooksandliars.com
Wal-Mart Sues, SCOTUS Screws Brain Damaged Woman

The family of Deborah Shank has lost its last chance to stop Wal-Mart Stores from recouping hundreds of thousands of dollars in medical expenses from an accident settlement the Shanks hoped to use for her future care in a nursing home.

Last November, the WSJ reported in a front-page story how the retail giant had sued Deborah Shank—a 52-year-old former Wal-Mart employee left permanently brain damaged from a car accident nearly eight years ago—for the money and won. Like most employee health plans, Wal-Mart’s gives it the right to recover medical expenses for accident-related care if a worker also collects damages in an injury suit.

After losing in federal court and again on appeal, the Shanks’ last legal hope was a bid to the U.S. Supreme Court. Yesterday, though, the court announced it wouldn’t take up the case, bringing the matter to a close.
Welcome to the Bush-Wal-Mart America. Corporations trump the common folk every time. Elections matter, vote Democratic in November.

Just what I see...

Nuff Said...

WE DON"T DO THAT part 3

Well, the Decider vetoed the Intelligence Authorization bill, stating that the CIA should not be held to the Army Field manual, which is of course written for dumb 18 year-olds who cannot even drink yet. Fucking asshole!
I forgot where I lifted this, but if you click links you will get where you supposed to.

President Bush Vetoes Prohibition on Torture

March 8th, 2008 by Karina

This morning, President Bush announced he vetoed the House and Senate passed Intelligence Authorization bill because it extended the prohibition on the use of waterboarding and other harsh coercive interrogation techniques that currently applies to the military to the entire Intelligence Community, including the CIA.

On the veto, Speaker Pelosi said:

The intelligence authorization bill invests in human intelligence, counterterrorism operations, and analysis to protect our nation and ensure that policymakers have access to accurate, timely and actionable intelligence. This legislation is a critical component of securing our nation and the President should have signed it into law.

Instead, the President vetoed these essential investments in our intelligence capabilities because this legislation extended the Army Field Manual’s prohibition on torture to Intelligence Community personnel. Failing to legally prohibit the use of waterboarding and other harsh torture techniques undermines our nation’s moral authority, puts American military and diplomatic personnel at-risk, and undermines the quality of intelligence.

In the final analysis, our ability to lead the world will depend not only on our military might, but also on our moral authority. We will begin to reassert that moral authority by attempting to override the President’s veto next week. The world must know that America does not torture.

Military leaders – including General David Petraeus, Commanding General of U.S. forces in Iraq – have publicly stated that these techniques are inhumane, un-American and are not necessary to produce results.

General David Petraeus, Commanding General of Iraq:

“Some may argue that we would be more effective if we sanctioned torture or other expedient methods to obtain information from the enemy. That would be wrong. Beyond the basic fact that such actions are illegal, history shows that they also are frequently neither useful nor necessary. Certainly, extreme physical action can make someone ‘talk;’ however, what the individual says may be of questionable value. In fact, our experience in applying the interrogations laid out in the Army Field Manual….that was published last year shows that the techniques in the manual work effectively and humanely in eliciting information from detainees.” [Open Letter, 5/10/07]

Lt. General Michael D. Maples, Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, asked by Sen. Carl Levin if he thinks waterboarding is consistent with the Geneva Conventions:

“No, sir, I don’t.”

Asked if it he believes it’s humane:

“No, sir. I think it would go beyond that bound.”
[Testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee, 2/27/08]

Lt. General Harry Soyster, (Ret.) Former Director of Defense Intelligence Agency:

“Experience shows that the field manual’s approaches to interrogation work. The Army Field Manual is comprehensive and sophisticated. It contains all the techniques any good interrogator needs to get accurate, reliable information, including out of the toughest customers.” [2/29/08]

Rear Admiral Donald J. Guter, (Ret.) Judge Advocate General, Navy, Rear Admiral John D. Hutson, (Ret.) Judge Advocate General, Navy, Major General John L. Fugh, (Ret.) Judge Advocate General, Army, Rear Admiral Donald J. Guter, (Ret.) Judge Advocate General, Navy:

“As far as we’re concerned, this shouldn’t be a point the United States should have to debate… There’s no disconnect between human rights and national security…They’re synergistic. One doesn’t work without the other for very long.” [Pittsburgh Post Gazette, 12/10/07]

Maj. General Evan Wallach, (Ret.) Judge Advocate General, Nevada National Guard:

“The United States knows quite a bit about waterboarding. The U.S. government — whether acting alone before domestic courts, commissions and courts-martial or as part of the world community — has not only condemned the use of water torture but has severely punished those who applied it… We know that U.S. military tribunals and U.S. judges have examined certain types of water-based interrogation and found that they constituted torture. That’s a lesson worth learning. The study of law is, after all, largely the study of history. The law of war is no different. This history should be of value to those who seek to understand what the law is — as well as what it ought to be.” [Washington Post, 11/4/07]

Brigadier General David M. Brahms, (Ret.) Staff Judge Advocate to the Commandant:

“Waterboarding is inhumane, it is torture, and it is illegal… This is a critically important issue - but it is not, and never has been, a complex issue, and even to suggest otherwise does a terrible disservice to this nation… Waterboarding detainees amounts to illegal torture in all circumstances. To suggest otherwise - or even to give credence to such a suggestion - represents both an affront to the law and to the core values of our nation.” [Letter, 11/2/07]

General Joseph Hoar, (Ret.), General David M. Maddox, (Ret.), Vice Admiral Lee F. Gunn, (Ret.), Vice Admiral Albert Konetzni Jr. Ret.), Maj. General Paul Eaton, (Ret.), Rear Admiral Don Guter, (Ret.), Maj. General Melvyn Montano, (Ret.), Brig. General David Brahms, (Ret.), Brig. General David Irvine, (Ret.), Brig. General Murray Sagsveen, (Ret.), General Paul J. Kern, (Ret.), General Merrill A. McPeak, (Ret.), Lt. General Claudia J. Kennedy, (Ret.), Lt. General Charles Otstott, (Ret.), Maj. General Eugene Fox, (Ret.), Maj. General Fred E. Haynes, (Ret.), Maj. General Gerald T. Sajer, (Ret.), Brig. General James P. Cullen, (Ret.), Brig. General John H. Johns, (Ret.), Brig. General Anthony Verrengia, (Ret.), General Charles Krulak, (Ret.), Admiral Stansfield Turner, (Ret.), Lt. General Donald L. Kerrick, (Ret.), Lt. General Harry E. Soyster, (Ret.), Maj. General John L. Fugh, (Ret.), Rear Admiral John D. Hutson, (Ret.), Maj. General Antonio M. Taguba, (Ret.), Brig. General Evelyn P. Foote, (Ret.), Brig. General Richard O’Meara, (Ret.), Brig. General Stephen N. Xenakis, (Ret.):

“We believe it is vital to the safety of our men and women in uniform that the United States not sanction the use of interrogation methods it would find unacceptable if inflicted by the enemy against captured Americans…The current situation, in which the military operates under one set of interrogation rules that are public and the CIA operates under a separate, secret set of rules, is unwise and impractical…What sets us apart from our enemies in this fight…is how we behave. In everything we do, we must observe the standards and values that dictate that we treat noncombatants and detainees with dignity and respect.” [Letter, 12/12/07]

Philip Zelikow was not interested in pursuing criticisms against Rice

Yes, And Richard Clarke should not be believed!
Fucking BASTARDS!
The one man, who was a professional and was carried over by this dog and pony show, before being demoted, and then ultimately resigning, should not be believed. WHY? Because he continuously warned Rice about the upcoming attack on 9/11 over and over again. Incompetent Fucking Crony bunch of corporate bastards!.
From thinkprogress.org

New York Times reporter Philip Shenon’s new book — The Commission: The Uncensored History of the 9/11 Investigation — paints a damning portrait of Condoleezza Rice. Shenon argues that Rice was “uninterested in actually advising the President,” but was instead more concerned with being his “closest confidante — specifically on foreign policy — and to simply translate his words into action.”

Today’s Sydney Morning Herald prints an extract from Shenon’s book which provides further details about Rice’s incompetence. “Emails from the National Security Council’s counter-terrorism director, Richard Clarke, showed that he had bombarded Rice with messages about terrorist threats” before 9/11, Shenon writes. Some examples:

“Bin Ladin Public Profile May Presage Attack” (May 3)

“Terrorist Groups Said Co-operating on US Hostage Plot” (May 23)

“Bin Ladin’s Networks’ Plans Advancing” (May 26)

“Bin Ladin Attacks May Be Imminent” (June 23)

“Bin Ladin and Associates Making Near-Term Threats” (June 25)

“Bin Ladin Planning High-Profile Attacks” (June 30)

“Planning for Bin Ladin Attacks Continues, Despite Delays” (July 2)

But 9/11 Commission staff director Philip Zelikow was not interested in pursuing criticisms against Rice. Zelikow — who had worked closely with Rice on the Bush transition team in 2000 and 2001 — “made it clear to the team’s investigators that Clarke should not be believed, that his testimony would be suspect.”

When 9/11 Commission historian Warren Bass uncovered a smoking gun email from Clarke to Rice written on September 4, 2001, which asked, “Are we serious about dealing with the al-Qaeda threat?,” Zelikow reverted to defending Condi. Bass then threatened to resign:

“I cannot do this,” Bass declared… “Zelikow is making me crazy.”

He was outraged by Zelikow and the White House; Bass felt the White House was trying to sabotage his work by its efforts to limit his ability to see certain documents from the NSC files and take useful notes from them. … Bass made it clear to colleagues that he believed Zelikow was interfering in his work for reasons that were overtly political - intended to shield the White House, and Rice in particular, from the commission’s criticism.

The former weapons inspector in Iraq — David Kay — passed word to the 9/11 Commission that he believed Rice was the “worst national security adviser” in the history of the job.

For an unbelievable look into this book check out the article from the Sydney Herald:

They knew, but did nothing

I JUST CAN"T GET ENOUGH OF THIS GUY

Dickwad Glenn Beck, in an interview this week with religious fucktard John Hagee was wondering if Barack Obama is the Antichrist. I mean, really, it's 2008 for fucks sake! Do people really believe this shit?? Do people think some desert religion is true? Anyway, this guy is way off the fucktard meter, why is he on CNN?? Oh, that's right, Money...
From Firedoglake.com:

First Adolph, Now Damien
By: David Neiwert Thursday March 6, 2008 6:00 pm

If you thought the wingnuts had reached their nadir with the comparisons of Obama to Hitler, it's important to remember: when it comes to the right, things can always get worse.

So this week we could find CNN's Glenn Beck, in an interview with religious crackpot John Hagee, wondering aloud if Obama is the Antichrist:

BECK: Let me ask you, and this is -- 'cause I got -- I get so much email on this, and I think a lot of people do, and I've only got a couple of seconds. Then they say "Glenn, you in the media, you've got to wake up. Barack Obama's making people faint and cry and everything else. And he's drawing people in and -- "

There are people -- and they said this about Bill Clinton -- that actually believe he might be the Antichrist. Odds that Barack Obama is the Antichrist?

Note that Beck somehow manages to not just overlook Hagee's many outrageous remarks about other faiths, but also lets Hagee misrepresent the reasons that Catholic activists have called him a bigot: "I have criticized the Catholic Church for its past anti-Semitism. But I have also been very critical of the Protestants and their anti-Semitism, especially as led by Martin Luther," he says. "Standing against anti-Semitism does not make me an anti-Catholic."

In reality, Hagee has done much more than just criticize Catholic anti-Semitism. In his latest book, he writes: "The sell-out of Catholicism to Hitler began not with the people but with the Vatican itself." He also has variously called the church "The Great Whore," an "apostate church," a "false cult system" and ... you guessed it ... "the "anti-Christ."

I guess that's why he told Beck that Obama isn't the anti-Christ. He's already got some other entity in mind.

Not that an ever-incisive observer like Glenn Beck could be bothered to mention this.

Of course, no one really takes Beck very seriously, except for the CNN poobahs who've given him a national megaphone to spew his verbal smegma. But you know how these things work.

In couple of weeks, it'll be on the tongues of the Village Idiots. Look for Tim Russert to grill Obama at some point about whether or not he has 666 tatooed on his ass.

After all, we were treated this week to the vapid maunderings of Maureen Dowd channeling Steve Sailer by depicting the Obama candidacy as being propelled largely by white guilt. And of course, the "Adolph Obama" theme first could be found out in wingnut territory before it came bubbling up in the mainsteam. Thanks to Beck, we've now skipped the fringe step and are broadcasting nutcase ideas to a mainstream national cable TV audience.

Next up: Obama is an alien!

FUCKING FUCKS

I just don't have anything more to say on this then the title, and perhaps ask Republican middle class why they vote against their own well being. Just keep working hard and giving your money over to these Multinational corporations,
and worry about the important things, like gay marriage and stuff!!

From thinkprogress.org:

KBR Dodges $500 Million In Social Security And Medicare Taxes In Cheney-Backed Scheme

No private contractor has financially profited from the Iraq war more than Kellogg Brown & Root (KBR), which until last year was a subsidiary of Halliburton. The firm currently has more than 21,000 employees in Iraq, and between 2004 and 2006, received more than $16 billion in government contracts — far more than any other corporation.

Yet KBR hasn’t been passing on these enormous profits to American taxpayers or even its own employees, thanks to a plan that Vice President Cheney helped establish. Today, the Boston Globe reports that KBR has avoided paying more than $500 million “in federal Medicare and Social Security taxes by hiring workers through shell companies” based in the Cayman Islands. A look at the costs to KBR employees:

While KBR’s use of the shell companies saves workers their half of the taxes, it deprives them of future retirement benefits.

In addition, the practice enables KBR to avoid paying unemployment taxes in Texas, where the company is registered, amounting to between $20 and $559 per American employee per year, depending on the company’s rate of turnover.

As a result, workers hired through the Cayman Island companies cannot receive unemployment assistance should they lose their jobs.

KBR’s practices are extreme, even compared to its competitors. Other top Iraq war contractors — including Bechtel and Parsons — pay Social Security and Medicare taxes for their employees.

The Bush administration has aided this tax dodging. One of KBR’s shell companies is Overseas Administrative Services, which was set up two months after Cheney became Halliburtion’s CEO in 1995. Since at least 2004, the Pentagon has known about KBR’s practices, but chosen to ignore the issue.

Of course, KBR is more than happy to claim workers as its own in one instance: when seeking “legal immunity extended to employers working in Iraq.”

What happens when Intellegent Men stand against the Little King

As you may recall, Adm. Fallon, head of Centcom ( he's Petraeus's boss), opposed the “surge” in Iraq and has consistently battled the Bush administration to avoid a confrontation with Iran, calling officials’ war-mongering “not helpful.” Privately, he has vowed that an attack on Iran “will not happen on my watch.”
This from thinkprogress.org:

Unfortunately, this level-headed thinking and willingness to stand up to President Bush may cost him his job. According to a new article by Thomas P.M. Barnett in the April issue of Esquire magazine (on newsstands March 12), Fallon may be prematurely “relieved of his command” as soon as this summer:

[W]ell-placed observers now say that it will come as no surprise if Fallon is relieved of his command before his time is up next spring, maybe as early as this summer, in favor of a commander the White House considers to be more pliable. If that were to happen, it may well mean that the president and vice-president intend to take military action against Iran before the end of this year and don’t want a commander standing in their way.

In the Esquire article, Fallon also said that he was in “hot water” with the White House for meeting with Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak. Fallon noted that such meetings are his job, and essential to making sure that regional leaders don’t get “too spun up” by the administration’s war rhetoric.

On september 12, 2007, Fallon was quoted:

derided "Petraeus as a sycophant" during their first meeting in Baghdad last March, according to Pentagon sources familiar with reports of the meeting.

Fallon told Petraeus that he considered him to be "an ass-kissing little chickenshit" and added, "I hate people like that", the sources say. That remark reportedly came after Petraeus began the meeting by making remarks that Fallon interpreted as trying to ingratiate himself with a superior.

And I love people like Admiral Fallon!

From Driftglass "The Evil That Men Do"

The following is lifted from Driftglass. I'ts just to good to be seen once.
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The Evil That Men Do

It is often pointed out that the price tag for the Dear Leader's Iraqi Catastrophe can be represented not only in actually dollars consumed (It will, in the end, send somewhere between 2-3 trillion of your tax dollars up in smoke, which, by way of comparison, represents roughly the entire GDP of Israel for the next 20 years) but that it can also be represented as opportunity costs

As the price of schools unbuilt, health care unprovided, bridges unrepaired and so forth.

To which I always respond, “Are you fucking insane?”

Because if, on Monday, the Sweet Queen Tinikling-Dancin’
Virgin Mary, the Wise Men and the entire Buddha Justice League reverse raptured (a helluva sexual position, BTW; you and a loved one should really try it sometime) down onto the Washington Mall bearing a Magic Mithras Day Sack containing three trillion dollars in gold and gave it to the United State Congress on the sole condition that it be spent on the poor and the needy or no fucking deal…

…come Tuesday morning bright and early the Republican Party would demand -- demand! – a three trillion dollar package of offsetting tax cuts and subsidies for billionaires, oil companies and telcoms.

And then would, without hesitation, they would take up their hollow Bibles and fake-patriot Flags and heroically filibuster tantrumbuster the government to a standstill until they got their way.

And if, by some miracle, a bill passed in both houses that did not include trillions of dollars in giveaways to Republican Party corporate overlords, the Dear Leader would veto it and then stagger onto the teevee machine and slur out some incoherent, half-in-the-bag explanation that would include the words “terr’ist”, “Democrat Party”, “surrender” and “nukuler”.

To the resounding cheers of the Pig People.

Because the Modern GOP is not interested in using the instrumentalities of government to help the citizens of the United States of America.

Not remotely.

Never were, and never will be, and no sane observer who watched the GOP tell sick children to fuck off because caring for them is “too expensive”, while were simultaneously forcing American taxpayers to shit solid gold ingots into the shifting sands of Iraq, day after day, month after month, for half a decade can reasonably believe otherwise anymore.

No, the GOP is interested in power solely for the same reason they have been amassing it for thirty years: in order to liquidate the government of the Unite States, sell off its assets to their cronies at pennies-on-the-dollar, and turn the full, voracious fury of an Imperial Presidency and unregulated corporate America loose on the world.

Period.

A free, open, hopeful, activist and progressive America is and always has been the Modern Conservative's worst nightmare; an fierce impediment to the Republican’s long-term goal of a full-privatized. one-world corporate feudal State.

For Jebus, of course.

And when Slagging Democracy is the program, as George Orwell reminds us in the ever-timely “1984”, permanent warfare serves one and only one purpose (emphasis scattered here and there by me):

…

The primary aim of modern warfare (in accordance with the principles of doublethink, this aim is simultaneously recognized and not recognized by the directing brains of the Inner Party) is to use up the products of the machine without raising the general standard of living.

Hellooooo SCHIP

…

Science and technology were developing at a prodigious speed, and it seemed natural to assume that they would go on developing. This failed to happen, partly because of the impoverishment caused by a long series of wars and revolutions, partly because scientific and technical progress depended on the empirical habit of thought, which could not survive in a strictly regimented society.

Got Christopaths?

…
And in fact, without being used for any such purpose, but by a sort of automatic process -- by producing wealth which it was sometimes impossible not to distribute -- the machine did raise the living standards of the average human being very greatly over a period of about fifty years at the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth centuries.

But it was also clear that an all-round increase in wealth threatened the destruction -- indeed, in some sense was the destruction -- of a hierarchical society. In a world in which everyone worked short hours, had enough to eat, lived in a house with a bathroom and a refrigerator, and possessed a motor-car or even an aeroplane, the most obvious and perhaps the most important form of inequality would already have disappeared.

…
For if leisure and security were enjoyed by all alike, the great mass of human beings who are normally stupefied by poverty would become literate and would learn to think for themselves; and when once they had done this, they would sooner or later realize that the privileged minority had no function, and they would sweep it away. In the long run, a hierarchical society was only possible on a basis of poverty and ignorance.
…

Shorter: Pin-headed hordes of trailer trash watching Fox News is not some accidental byproduct of the Conservative Movement.

It is the Movement's apotheosis.

The problem was how to keep the wheels of industry turning without increasing the real wealth of the world. Goods must be produced, but they must not be distributed. And in practice the only way of achieving this was by continuous warfare.

The essential act of war is destruction, not necessarily of human lives, but of the products of human labour. War is a way of shattering to pieces, or pouring into the stratosphere, or sinking in the depths of the sea, materials which might otherwise be used to make the masses too comfortable, and hence, in the long run, too intelligent. Even when weapons of war are not actually destroyed, their manufacture is still a convenient way of expending labour power without producing anything that can be consumed. A Floating Fortress, for example, has locked up in it the labour that would build several hundred cargo-ships. Ultimately it is scrapped as obsolete, never having brought any material benefit to anybody, and with further enormous labours another Floating Fortress is built.

In principle the war effort is always so planned as to eat up any surplus that might exist after meeting the bare needs of the population. In practice the needs of the population are always underestimated, with the result that there is a chronic shortage of half the necessities of life; but this is looked on as an advantage.

…
It is deliberate policy to keep even the favoured groups somewhere near the brink of hardship, because a general state of scarcity increases the importance of small privileges and thus magnifies the distinction between one group and another.

Like Health Care.

Like affordable housing.

Like a college education for everyone who wants one.

Like safe food.

Clean water.

Unpolluted air.

All of which could be well within the reach of the average American if we as a nation chose to focus our efforts into making it so.

But instead, all rapidly becoming commoditized into premiums that only the privileged will be able to afford.

…
War, it will be seen, accomplishes the necessary destruction, but accomplishes it in a psychologically acceptable way. In principle it would be quite simple to waste the surplus labour of the world by building temples and pyramids, by digging holes and filling them up again, or even by producing vast quantities of goods and then setting fire to them. But this would provide only the economic and not the emotional basis for a hierarchical society.

What is concerned here is not the morale of masses, whose attitude is unimportant so long as they are kept steadily at work, but the morale of the Party itself.

And this is where the parallels with the Bush Regime are most striking…

Even the humblest Party member is expected to be competent, industrious, and even intelligent within narrow limits, but it is also necessary that he should be a credulous and ignorant fanatic whose prevailing moods are fear, hatred, adulation, and orgiastic triumph.

Offhand, can anyone think of any past or current members-in-good-standing of the ruling clique -- from Monica Goodling to Ann Coulter to Alberto Gonzalez -- to which the description "credulous and ignorant fanatic" does not apply?

In other words it is necessary that he should have the mentality appropriate to a state of war. It does not matter whether the war is actually happening, and, since no decisive victory is possible, it does not matter whether the war is going well or badly. All that is needed is that a state of war should exist.

…

It is precisely in the Inner Party that war hysteria and hatred of the enemy are strongest. In his capacity as an administrator, it is often necessary for a member of the Inner Party to know that this or that item of war news is untruthful, and he may often be aware that the entire war is spurious and is either not happening or is being waged for purposes quite other than the declared ones: but such knowledge is easily neutralized by the technique of doublethink. Meanwhile no Inner Party member wavers for an instant in his mystical belief that the war is real, and that it is bound to end victoriously, with Oceania the undisputed master of the entire world.

Which is why, on Mondays and Wednesdays, the Dear Leader announces definitively that Osama bin Laden is a marginalized, beaten, punk that we really don't need to worry about any more.

While on Tuesdays and Thursdays, the Dear Leader announces with equal certitude that Osama bin Laden is an opponent so wily, vicious and dangerous that if OBL says that the United States leaving Iraq is his goal, well then just to be on the safe side, to thwart him we had just damned well better stay in Iraq for the next 100 years hadn't we!

That even hinting we might someday leave Iraq would hand Global Victory Forevah over to this monstrous villain and his vast army of kill-crazy jihadists!

Even though, as the Dear Leader reminds us on Friday, bin Laden is a half-dead loser, reduced to skulking impotently in caves in fear of his life.

…

There are therefore two great problems which the Party is concerned to solve. One is how to discover, against his will, what another human being is thinking, and the other is how to kill several hundred million people in a few seconds without giving warning beforehand. In so far as scientific research still continues, this is its subject matter. The scientist of today is either a mixture of psychologist and inquisitor, studying with real ordinary minuteness the meaning of facial expressions, gestures, and tones of voice, and testing the truth-producing effects of drugs, shock therapy, hypnosis, and physical torture…

In past ages, a war, almost by definition, was something that sooner or later came to an end, usually in unmistakable victory or defeat. In the past, also, war was one of the main instruments by which human societies were kept in touch with physical reality. All rulers in all ages have tried to impose a false view of the world upon their followers, but they could not afford to encourage any illusion that tended to impair military efficiency.

…

But when war becomes literally continuous, it also ceases to be dangerous. When war is continuous there is no such thing as military necessity. Technical progress can cease and the most palpable facts can be denied or disregarded. As we have seen, researches that could be called scientific are still carried out for the purposes of war, but they are essentially a kind of daydreaming, and their failure to show results is not important. Efficiency, even military efficiency, is no longer needed.

Nothing is efficient in Oceania except the Thought Police.
…

The war, therefore, if we judge it by the standards of previous wars, is merely an imposture. It is like the battles between certain ruminant animals whose horns are set at such an angle that they are incapable of hurting one another. But though it is unreal it is not meaningless. It eats up the surplus of consumable goods, and it helps to preserve the special mental atmosphere that a hierarchical society needs.

War, it will be seen, is now a purely internal affair. In the past, the ruling groups of all countries, although they might recognize their common interest and therefore limit the destructiveness of war, did fight against one another, and the victor always plundered the vanquished. In our own day they are not fighting against one another at all. The war is waged by each ruling group against its own subjects, and the object of the war is not to make or prevent conquests of territory, but to keep the structure of society intact.

This -- although the vast majority of Party members understand it only in a shallower sense -- is the inner meaning of the Party slogan: War is Peace.

Republicans do not care that America was attacked while its leaders slept.

That the wars they started are pointless.

That the wars they started will never end.

That our enemies are now mere shadow puppets to be trotted out only when it becomes necessary to terrify the public into supporting one stupid, disastrous policy after another.

That we have lost whole cities like New Orleans through Republican incompetence.

That the post-conquest Iraq was turned over to children, cronies and party hacks to be looted and run into oblivion.

They do not give a shit that “nothing is efficient in Oceania” except the apparatus by which the Bush Regime maintains its gulags and illegally spies on its citizens. Except the regularity with this the Constitution is sneeringly violated by their Dear Leader.

Because the “object of the war is not to make or prevent conquests of territory, but to keep the structure of society intact."

Because for the GOP, "1984" is not cautionary, dystopia science fiction; it is an ideological playbook they cheerfully follow into Hell.

And this is possible only because, for the GOP, abysmal, hateful Ignorance really is their only remaining Strength. posted by driftglass @ 11:42 PM