Talk to the Hand
Every game has a distinctive fire-and-dodge action
that you will gradually master.
In Defender it is a fast two-finger action
on Fire and Thrust,
in Asteroids a spray action on Fire and Rotate.
In Space Invaders it is a continuous co-ordination
of Fire and retreat, Fire and retreat ...."
--Invasion of the Space Invaders, Martin Amis
We were as men who through a fen
Of filthy darkness grope:
We did not dare to breathe a prayer,
Or give our anguish scope:
Something was dead in each of us,
And what was dead was Hope
--The Ballad of Reading Gaol, Oscar Wilde
--I thought you spies knew everything.
--Only God knows everything.
He works for Mossad
--The Constant Gardner (2005)
____________________
Max Boot in the L.A. Times argues that the U.S. not only stop al Qaeda, but also stop it from "regenerating itself as it has in the past" (Staying the Course in Afghanistan.) That means preventing the Taliban from returning to prominence and projecting power into Pakistan.
While the suggestion that the U.S. operate as constant gardener of evil weeds has a nice ring of closure, how can anyone or anything stop anyone or anything from regenerating itself? One can spray Ortho Weed Control, but sure as hell those weeds will be back in a few weeks, usually hardier than ever.
We do not control the future. We control only now, and that just barely. How can anyone say that we are trying to keep the Taliban from returning to prominence and projecting their power into Pakistan? This seems ass backwards since the problem with the Taliban began, matured and to date is the result of Pakistan's projection of power into Afghanistan rather than vice versa, as Max Boot and crew would assert.
How many decades, or centuries, should the U.S. allocate to giving the surge time to work? When did the U.S. begin championing its failures? The ill-fated Challenger mission made its way onto a license plate, as did the seriously dead Nascar hero Dale Earnhardt. Keeping people from joining groups which are their pleasure is a losing proposition -- why does the U.S. want to be a loser?
We could say, "Home by Christmas", but what year?
that you will gradually master.
In Defender it is a fast two-finger action
on Fire and Thrust,
in Asteroids a spray action on Fire and Rotate.
In Space Invaders it is a continuous co-ordination
of Fire and retreat, Fire and retreat ...."
--Invasion of the Space Invaders, Martin Amis
We were as men who through a fen
Of filthy darkness grope:
We did not dare to breathe a prayer,
Or give our anguish scope:
Something was dead in each of us,
And what was dead was Hope
--The Ballad of Reading Gaol, Oscar Wilde
--I thought you spies knew everything.
--Only God knows everything.
He works for Mossad
--The Constant Gardner (2005)
____________________
Max Boot in the L.A. Times argues that the U.S. not only stop al Qaeda, but also stop it from "regenerating itself as it has in the past" (Staying the Course in Afghanistan.) That means preventing the Taliban from returning to prominence and projecting power into Pakistan.
While the suggestion that the U.S. operate as constant gardener of evil weeds has a nice ring of closure, how can anyone or anything stop anyone or anything from regenerating itself? One can spray Ortho Weed Control, but sure as hell those weeds will be back in a few weeks, usually hardier than ever.
We do not control the future. We control only now, and that just barely. How can anyone say that we are trying to keep the Taliban from returning to prominence and projecting their power into Pakistan? This seems ass backwards since the problem with the Taliban began, matured and to date is the result of Pakistan's projection of power into Afghanistan rather than vice versa, as Max Boot and crew would assert.
How many decades, or centuries, should the U.S. allocate to giving the surge time to work? When did the U.S. begin championing its failures? The ill-fated Challenger mission made its way onto a license plate, as did the seriously dead Nascar hero Dale Earnhardt. Keeping people from joining groups which are their pleasure is a losing proposition -- why does the U.S. want to be a loser?
We could say, "Home by Christmas", but what year?
Labels: afghan war, afghanistan, al qaeda, constant gardener, taliban
posted by rangeragainstwar at 5:16 PM
7 Comments:
Ranger;
I'm afraid its now infected the USofA to the core. Exhibit One: 9-11. I view it as a failure of our national security apparatus and it is, indeed, a sad story but the inability or unwillingness to move on (note it has become an unofficial national day of mourning with all the public "memorials" competing for top billing) is a sure sign of the self pity on display by a loser. Of course, with the predominance of the chicken hawks in politics these days, what else should I expect. My experience with military types, especially those who have actually been to war, is the ability to move on. When you turn the time machine off, you are dead.
Y'all,
Right on, Blakenator.
"..a sure sign of the self pity on display by a loser."
Best not run that one down on the boys at the Legion Hall. or the VFW or the Chamber of Commerce ..hell, no one wants to hear that we've become our own worst enemies" : outta malice? greed? ignorance?
Flouride in the water? Too much tee-vee, NASCAR, fear?
Or just pain meanness?
Everybody looking for an answer, a source..THE reason why?
Doesn't matter, because we aren't gonna change our habits anyhoo, as Ranger has pointed out so many times in his PWOT missives. just like middle schoolers , when asked a question about ..whatever..answers with " I feel".
"Hell, Sonny, I didn't ask you how you felt, I was looking for a fact."
Sad part is we're not talkin' middle schoolers here, but the majority of the adult population of the USA.
Ain't nobody listening but us, and there aren't that many of us anyway, so we just keep talkin' to each other, which isn't all that bad--keeps us from going any crazier, I suppose.
Then again...
there it is...
Deryle
If we are concerned about 'what created the world?' and 'why are we here?' then consider the parable of the poison arrow.
A man went to the Buddha insisting on answers to questions of how the world was formed, and how man's problemsa came to be but the Buddha instead put a question to him: "If you were shot by a poison arrow, and a doctor was summoned to extract it, what would you do? Would you ask such questions as who shot the arrow, from which tribe did he come, who made the arrow, who made the poison, etc., or would you have the doctor immediately pull out the arrow?"
"Of course," replied the man, "I would have the arrow pulled out as quickly as possible." The Buddha concluded, "That is wise, for the task before us is the solving of life's problems; until the problems are solved, these questions are of secondary importance."
Now, do we sign on again..or....
Blakenator,
I'm absolutely baffled as to why we want to commemorate our losses and roil about in such self pity. the British poster from WW II, "Keep calm, carry on" expresses a sentiment so foreign to the indulged American...
Deryle,
I appreciate your tryin' to say it like it is; we're all trying. there is a reality, though the spin-meisters would like to distract us.
Thank you for sharing the poison arrow parable -- good lesson any time we get to whinging.
Lisa..thanks for giving credit where it not be due..All I'm tryin to do is to" keep on keepin on"...as some song'riter once said..
I'd just returned from a visit to the VA Hospital, so I was, as you understand, primed. All them old men still wearing "Ya-hoo war" shit like they were off on some boy scout expeditiion...well, come to think of it...hmmm...
Enough to make a grown man cry..
Leaving the place, I actually saw a pickup truck with one of those sunscreens in the back window with big ol eagle, superimposed over it was "America Love it or Leave It"
Jeez'm,,rerun time...
Hell, I couldn't resist, so I wrote him a note and left it on hie windshield quoting Dick Gregory:
" I'll love it when it becomes loveable, and I'll leave it when I'm good and damn ready."
Probably set his therapy back a little
I do understand..at one point early in my stint in Vietnam, before I knew better, every man I hadn't hand picked for my crew, was one of McNamara's 100,00 .No need for explanation here, save Daniel Moynahan's cock-eyed idea that drafting mentallly deficient boys would later give them a leg up in life--due to the benefits, I'm sure, and having nothing to do with the machine demanding cannon-fodder.So I got a crew full of --well, idiots.
Data shows a shit load of that bunch dies or were wounded or got some mother's fool killed.
When I see them all over the place now, wearing their war-cheer clothes and hats and pins and affiliated garb, professional flag-draggers", as it were, I know immediately they were part of McNamara's Picks.
Or REMFs..or worse.
Saddest part now is all those young ones, back from multiple misadventures in the cradle of civilization, sitting there awaiting their benefits with the VietVets and the last of the "greatest generation"--just like Vietnam never happened.
this is my long-winded way of getting back to something you said:
Speaking of..in your quest to to understand why we keep worshippin' old dead stuff, I'll yield to one of the greats:
Terry Allen..Last verse of After The Fall" pretty much sums it up for me verse here:
Hey Remember all those
psychedelic nights
When your head come loose
and floated into the lights
And all them girls
without any tops at all
Down in the dirt uhhh huhh
After the Fall
And Remember how all the
fantasies worked
Little flags in front of the tract homes
by the church
It's a wonder anything's left
to hurt at all
Down in the dirt uhhh huhh
After the Fall
Yea
Remember the flower children
and their shit-eating grins
Wearing buckskin building teepees
trying to be Indians
An Remember the reservation
with the drunks against the wall
Peddling turquoise to the tourists
Down in the dirt uhhh huhh
After the Fall
Remember the Holy Road
running red
With blood from the mouths of mystics
when they said
"Let's eat flesh from the knees of Jesus
while he crawls"
Down in the dirt uhhh huhh
After the Fall
Yeah
Remember the Christian Soldiers
armed to the teeth beneath the stars
Watching the jungle burn
from beside their armored cars
We saw it all on TV
while we ate just what we saw
So we could partake in history
without our names on the Wall or
Down in the dirt uhhh huhh
After the Fall.
That's from a great album he did called Amerasia.
Highly recommended.
We worship all that dead shit cause we want to participate in something larger than ourselves.The shame of it is that we chose to glorify war, and not some great humanitarian act.
I'm feeling less and less American as the days go by.
There it is..again.
thanks for lissenin'..
Deryle
D,
This reply should be a essay that stands alone.
When i was line infy my 577 driver was A MACNAMARA. He was a good man but he did get hurt pretty bad in a driving accident-in a peacetime exercise.
He didn't lock the drivers hatch properly and it fell and hit his head , and this caused him to bite his tongue off. I say again- he was a good man and he tried, but he should not have been there.
Hell, i had a high IQ and i doubt that i shouldda been there.
jim
Jim,
"Ponst my return from "Serving my Country" (where's that little copyright thing you put at the end of PWOT? I could use one here.) I had to play Army for 10 more months, some of which were summer.The National Guard would come to Ft Carson to drink up all the beer they could and play Army too. They'd mostly drive like bats out of hell all over the place, like t e kids they were.
We'd supposedly "train" them in how to be cannon-cockers like Topeka Kansas was gonna need some serious artillery coverage after the next football game, I guess.
Believe it or no..naa--you probably will--they were worse to deal with than the McNamaras. At least the Project 100,000 crew were surrounded by...
Well, don't want to get in too deep here.
Every single one of the Project 100,000 that I had in my crews over 10 months had to be evacuated for some strange or stupid reason.
All unnecessary.
All sad.
I don't know what any of this means. Like Gomer..err..Forrest said, "Stupid id as stupid does."
Dumb-assed comment from a dumb-assed movie, but even a stopped clock is right twice a day.
There it is.
Deryle
Deryle,
You are wicked ... I do like your self-reflection, "Probably set his therapy back a little". Deservedly so. I do believe your blinkers are off.
Thanks for ATF lyrics. So you think we want to participate in something larger than the self? Possibly.
Sad stuff re. the McNamara's 100,000. They couldn't so better; what's the rest's explanation for their idiocy?
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