Americans ask about jobs, but President Obama keeps bragging about killing Osama bin Laden a year ago. Meanwhile, a report in the UK Daily Mail notes that there are dozens of secret drone sites in the United States, clearly directed against domestic targets.
Creative Job Destruction
Ted Rall
Ted Rall is a syndicated political cartoonist for Andrews McMeel Syndication, WhoWhatWhy.org and Counterpoint. He is a frequent contributor to The Wall Street Journal, a graphic novelist and author of many books of art and prose, and an occasional war correspondent. He is, recently, the author of the graphic novel "The Stringer."
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I like this cartoon because Mr Rall shows how Osama was killed much more accurately than the ‘official’ version (recently lauded on Jon Stewart).
The ‘official version’ is that ‘enhanced interrogation’ (it’s illegal, under US law, to call it ‘torture’) revealed the name of the courier. Then US surveillance tracked the courier to bin Laden’s hide-out. Then Obama sent the Seals in against a heavily armed, well-fortified, multimillion dollar fortress, but the Seals prevailed and managed, after a fierce firefight, to kill bin Laden and his warriors without the slightest injury to a single Seal. And all thanks to Obama’s brilliant leadership. The fact that this cannot be factual based on the logic of firefights just shows that old-fashioned logic has no place in the 21st century.
It slipped out that Osama was almost certainly under the protection of Pakistan, which requires that those in its protection are not allowed any weapons. And that Obama had spies surrounding Osama’s complex for at least a year before the Seals went in for the assassination.
So, not certain but fairly sure that Osama was unarmed, Obama sent the Seals in to execute all the adult males (plus one woman, killed by a frightened squad sent into an auxiliary accommodation). The Pakistanis showed the photos, and forensics determined that the abandoned corpses had been executed, not killed in a firefight, but the US news is now Pravda (which means, ‘Absolute Trvth’) and so tells the ‘TRVE’ story, not what actually happened.
Meanwhile, Mr Rall is vehemently denounced by the right and by the Obamabots, and, under US law, President Obama has every legal right to have him killed at any time for any reason or for no reason.
And US law also allows President Obama to send drones against those who support Mr Rall by their comments.
So I’m watching out my window now to see if any drones are coming at me.
The whole killing of Osama Bin Laden (OBL) was very strange, but as been observed our Pravda Mega-Media asked no real questions. How is it the most wanted man on the face of the earth is living less than a mile from the so-called West Point of Pakistan the Pakistan Military Academy? OBL had the experience being hunted by the Soviets and then the Americans and yet his compound is surprising devoid of defense structures.
There are only two ways to attack the compound, one via Chopper, and the other through the walls. You would think OBL would have had some large trees planted to obstruct a chopper landing, or have poles in the yard. You might also think he would have had the compound heavily mined and booby trapped to thwart an attack.
You would also think the most wanted man on the face of the earth would have been armed like Tony Montana in Scarface, and would go out like Scarface.
OBL seemed to almost be in Witness Protection Program, be a good boy don’t cause trouble and you will be protected.
I think just came down to the time where it was decided OBL needed to be harvested.
As for OBL …
This really isn’t that hard at all. If OBL had been an NYPD officer who handcuffed 2,984 people and proceeded to pistol-whip each one of them to death while being secretly videotaped, the courtroom would be packed with uniformed police officers showing support for their maligned and totally innocent fellow officer. A string of top-notch lawyers would be ready and waiting to interrogate the camcorder operator. The head of the police union would be there too.
And what would the pre-arranged verdict be in that jury-waived trial? That’s right. Probation, a demotion that won’t effect OBL’s pension, and a strongly — really, it’s quite strongly — worded letter of reprimand, which will be placed in his file, at least until it disappears a couple years later. This brutal and draconian sentence will not only be appealed instantly, Det. OBL would be instantly swaddled in the loving cocoon of NYPD protection.
In a similar fashion, OBL was protected by the Pakistan government, a government no less corrupt than the NYPD. Anyone who understands the past 60 years of American thuggishness in foreign policy knows that it boiled down to: “The fucking Americans really want OBL. Every day he remains alive is just one more drop of piss in their eyes. We don’t know that OBL’s living at Apt. 34 at 123 Fake St., do we? No, I didn’t think we knew that. Oh, well. Let’s reassure the Americans that we’re super-duper doing our best to find OBL.”
The chickens are coming home to roost. All the decades of U.S. shenanigans have finally eaten away at any reserve of respect that we might have once drawn upon. I suspect that quite a few people in Pakistan had a good laugh over how OBL was, literally, just a couple minutes away from their version of West Point for months or years. Why on Earth bother with landmines or trees? The only reason OBL got killed was because someone on Team Obama figured out what everyone with half a brain already knew: the Pakistan government has no reason to love the U.S., and would probably turn a blind eye to any Muslim that could shove the U.S.’s nose in the kind of shit we regularly dump on other people.
Personally, I think the people who should be most concerned are the Israelis. Pakistan’s behavior clearly shows that the U.S. is entering the downward arc of empire. And Israel without U.S. tax dollars is going to be in for very rough sledding indeed.
Join the military!
Prepare for your future!!
“Drone-out” civilian job applicants!!!
Wait a moment ! As any properly educated economist will tell you, reducing the number of unemployed is *not* a good way to make the rich richer and the poor poorer, which is the purpose of all good government….
Henri