(no subject)

[sophiaserpentia]

Bleat the horns! Encourage your sons -- oh, and I guess your daughters too, though we'd prefer they stay home to make babies -- to join the imperial army!

Oh, and by all means, don't tell the actual truth about war. And if you do happen to mention that people sometimes get killed in war, by all means, don't tell the truth about THIS particular war, in which so far 1750 Americans and 25,000 innocent Iraqi civilians have been killed.

Especially if you are a member of this nation's empire's governing body, who might be interested in getting to hear some truth about 9/11, the WMDs that never really existed, the link between Saddam and Osama that never really existed, and the facts which seem to have been fixed around the policy.

Several Senate Republicans denounced other lawmakers and the news media on Thursday for unfavorable depictions of the Iraq war and the Pentagon urged members of Congress to talk up military service to help ease a recruiting shortfall.

Families are discouraging young men and women from enlisting "because of all the negative media that's out there," Sen. James Inhofe, an Oklahoma Republican, said at a U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee hearing. Inhofe also said that other senators' criticism of the war contributed to the propaganda of U.S. enemies. He did not name the senators.

Army Chief of Staff Peter Schoomaker urged members of Congress to use "your considerable influence to explain to the American people and to those that are influencers out there how important it is for our young people to serve this nation at a time like this." The Army on Wednesday said it was 14 percent, or about 7,800 recruits, behind its year-to-date recruitment target even though it exceeded its monthly target in June. With extended deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan, recruiting also is down for the National Guard and the Reserves.

"With the deluge of negative news that we get daily, it's just amazing to me that anybody would want to sign up," said Sen. Pat Roberts, a Kansas Republican.

Facing flagging support for the Iraq war that has killed about 1,750 U.S. forces,President Bush in a speech on Tuesday acknowledged the nation's doubts about the strategy but insisted the operation was worthwhile and portrayed Iraq as a key battlefield against terrorists. Bush himself made a pitch for military service. "We live in freedom because every generation has produced patriots willing to serve a cause greater than themselves. Those who serve today are taking their rightful place among the greatest generations that have worn our nation's uniform," he said.

from Army recruits shortfall blamed on Iraq war critics

So, right, it's the media and the critics who are to blame, not, oh, the lying chickenhawks who started the war, or the people with guns and bombs actually killing people. Oh, no, they're not the ones to blame -- it's those... those unpatriotic critics. And don't consider for a moment that the lower-class, mostly minority, lack-of-career-prospect-having young men and women being targeted by massive army propaganda campaigns and flag-waving might be able to put together the truth for themselves, especially when they look at what is happening to the Iraqi people and have some idea of what it feels like to be oppressed. Maybe they don't like having to choose between McDonalds or having their jaw blown off by a car-bomb attack.

Suddenly, now, you're a threat if you ask honest questions or speak the truth. Since when have truth and honesty ever been a threat to democracy? Only when deceit and greed are running the show.

Edit to add this tidbit from an opinion piece in USAToday:

Last fall, Charles Moskos of Northwestern University, a prominent expert on military manpower, asked a group of recruiters what would most help them: tripling bonuses or enlisting presidential daughter Jenna Bush. The recruiters' choice was unanimous: Jenna Bush.

Comments

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

These people truly give the Romans a run for being delusional lunatics.

[matthardwick.livejournal.com]

My apologies for breaking Godwin's law and for any rudeness on my part, but I think you mean the Nazi Germans, Alexandrian Macedonians, or Napoleonic French, not the Romans. The Romans, for all the delusions of such individual nutsoid leaders like Julius Caesar, at least were capable of running a system of government over a multicultural group of people and were able to neutralize a proto-Non-Governmental Organization's threat to their power (It was the Huns and Visigoths and such that eventually destroyed the Romans, not the Christians.) Believe me, this takes a massive amount of the kind of common sense and pragmatism that is obviously lacking amongst the Cultural and Political Elite of this country today.

Look around for an old-but-still-relevant article by E.H. Gombrich called, I think, "Myth And Reality in German Wartime Broadcasts". You'd find it rather fascinating reading, given recent events...:-)

[azaz-al.livejournal.com]

Yes, the media version of what is happening in Iraq is totally and completely skewed by the Goddless Liberals (tm)! The Iraqis are actually throwing flower petals in the path of all Our Brave Boys and all those stories about people being blown up and shot at and burned to death and taken hostage are lies and the pictures are horror film effects! And if they so much as get an ingrown toenail they are allowed to go on leave, and they get extra big bonuses for having such a tough job! It's all the media's fault no one wants to sign up!

[aerope.livejournal.com]

you know how in fahrenheit 9/11, michael moore went around asking congressmen if they'd send their children to war? somehow i don't think that's what they're going to do in order to "talk it up," even though that really should be the level of support for a war that is really worth sacrificing young people's lives that you hold before telling other people's kids to sign up. nope. aim the recruitment methods at the others, the strangers.

man. army recruitment isn't down because there are critics of the war. army recruitment is down because there is a war that is killing thousands over something that's not a clear and present danger to the us. where's the *incentive* to join?

[liminalia.livejournal.com]

You took my comment right outta my mouth. Let's see the Congressfolks putting their kids on the line. Then they can bitch.

[matthardwick.livejournal.com]

From Bush's speech:

We live in freedom because every generation has produced patriots willing to serve a cause greater than themselves. Those who serve today are taking their rightful place among the greatest generations that have worn our nation's uniform.

Italics mine.

There's been paranoiac ramblings amongst the Pro-Warriors that withdrawing our troops from Iraq now would somehow "send a message" to the Iraqi Insurrection and their Terrorist "colleagues" that all they have to do is out-wait the U.S.. Well, this assumes two things about the I.I. and the Terrorists:

1. That it's very easy to send "messages" to them, and
2. That they're knowledgable enough of the MSM's shibboleths and Western Pop Culture to interpret those messages, and come to the same conclusions as the Pro-Warriors.

Erm...no. The MSM may be pervasive but it ain't that pervasive. And even if it were, IMHO the abusive use-to-excess of such cliches as "Greatest Generation" and "cause larger than one's self" sends far more of a message to all kinds of Terrorists worldwide about the lack of tactical imagination on the part of the Americans than withdrawing from Iraq ever would...:-/

[liminalia.livejournal.com]

MSM?

[matthardwick.livejournal.com]

MSM is online political blogslang acronym for MainStream Media, i.e. New York Times, USA Today, the Network News shows, CNN, etc. The right has been using this acronym a lot lately, especially in regards to Iraq. IMHO, it's a cute acronym, and way I figure it, far to likable to waste on one side of the political aisle...

That having been said: Believe me, it confused me a bunch when I first saw it on their blogs n' websites. I assumed it was some kinda ironic protest against Microsoft for its level-headed pro-gay-rights benefits policies, and was wondering, "Why is the right ragging on Microsoft by misspelling the acronym of the MicroSoft Network (i.e. MSN) website?"...
;-)