Somebody miss the 1970s - Arab oil - Hello, anyone home?
This entry was posted on 1/15/2008 6:14 PM and is filed under Big Sleepy AmPub,Crappy Economy Redux,Bowling Ball Economics,Are we really inept.
Bowling ball economics - put the whole of the American economy and 300 million Americans in the back of a giant pickup truck, drop in a bowling ball, drive down a dirt road in Texas at 80 miles per hour.
I usually avoid passing judgment on the Administration in its foreign policy misadventures, but some times it is too easy to take a gift when it is served up on a silver platter.
President George W. Bush visited Saudi Arabia this week. He bears gifts of military arms - gifts which apparently the Saudis must buy. The Prez then asks the Saudis to pump more oil which the said Prez suggests will lower the price at the American pumps. The Saudi economic minister says something like, "Bugger off President Infidel." Then Prez and Saudi royalty retreat to an exclusive palace that if any of us shlubs even glanced at might hazard us a beheading.
How many poetic ironies are in the above paragraph? If I had not lived through the 1970s I would not be wiping a tear from my one good eye now. Let me suggest some latent messages peeping out of the Prez's encounter for the paper tiger elitists who may actually find a visit like this one stoic diplomacy.
1. How many of my colleagues that now work two jobs flipping pizza due to real jobs having moved to China will the military weapons benefit? They are probably made in China anyways.
2. Didn't we notice it might be best to dislodge ourselves from Arab oil back in 1974 during the Arab Oil Embargo?
3. We offer them weapons systems to buy, but offer them none of our belief systems in freedoms.
4. The Prez hobnobs with royalty from a regime that treats their own women and foreign workers like shit.
5. No mention of addressing a culture that nursed the gestation of the majority of the 9-Eleven attackers.
6. Freedom = movement in the "many states" - empty gas tanks means compromised freedoms. For better or worse we facilitate our freedoms via our cars.
7. And oh yes - the band played on!
Stupid pop culture, media-complex, distraction-from-reality story
I am thinking, each day I should jot down the stupidest news story that is foist upon us by the big-media-complex as a distraction from the reality that has become America. So here we go - welcome to today's "Stupid Pop Culture, Media-complex, Distraction-from-reality Story."
Hey everybody, instead of talking about high fuel prices and the working class being ground into the dirt, the Presidential candidates quibble about who hurt whose feelings on the campaign trail. Oh to hell with those two-party paradigm hacks. Wait, here is the real damn story. UFO attacks Texas. Good Jesus, Joseph, and sweat Mother Mary - break out the tin foil to tuck into my base ball cap so they can't attack my thoughts. Run for you lives people, we are all going to fuck'n die!!! Now there is some real God damned news!
Wisconsin military service person of the week
This week's Wisconsin soldier to remember is Marine Lance Corporal John Mattek Jr., 24, who died from wounds he received from a roadside bomb that exploded near his Humvee in Anbar Province, Iraq. John died in the hospital in Maryland on Monday, June 13, 2005. The explosion was on June 8. He was a gunner on an armored vehicle. Lance Corporal Mattek was flown to Germany and then to Maryland. He was assigned to Company B, 2nd Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion, Regimental Combat Team-2, 2nd Marine Division, 2nd Marine Expeditionary Force. The unit's home base is in Camp Lejeune, North Carolina. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel mentioned John played linebacker on the football team for Antigo High School and after graduating high school in 1999, he went on to play strong safety and special teams for the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point's football team. John Mattek Jr. was the 40th Wisconsin service member to be killed in Iraq since the spring of 2003.
3,923 Americans have been killed in Iraq since Spring, 2003.
474 Americans have been killed in Afghanistan since October, 2001.
28,882 U.S. troops have been wounded in action in Iraq since Spring, 2003.
1,851 U.S. troops have been wounded in action in Afghanistan since October, 2001.
84 Wisconsin soldiers have been killed in Iraq since Spring, 2003.
6 Wisconsin soldiers have been killed in Afghanistan since October, 2001.
125 journalists (several nationalities) have been killed in Iraq since Spring, 2003.
14 journalists (various nationalities) have been killed in Afghanistan since October, 2001.
Soldier of the week, military casualty, and journalist casualty information sources: Committee to Protect Journalists; cnn.com; Milwaukee Journal Sentinel; washingtonpost.com; and, icasualties.org.
