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Psychopathic behavior



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Published: November 23, 2009

From all sorts of sources we're given all sorts of supposedly logical reasons why we are enmeshed in military violence in Afghanistan and why thousands more American troops may have to go there and risk getting killed and killing others. Getting killed is awful, and killing is a powerful taboo in all civilizations unless, of course, those who murder "kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets" as Voltaire said already a very long time ago. So it seems we should ignore those supposed logical reasons and not sound trumpets, or whatever it is that glorifies war nowadays, but a loud no, a loud enough already. Getting the Nobel Peace prize is no excuse for escalating yet another wrong war.

By way of an Associated Press story headlined "4-hour battle waged at Afghan village" on Nov. 5, you shared with your readers a vivid account of what may be happening again and again all over Afghanistan. Eerily, it reminded my husband and me of Clint Eastwood's "Flag of our Fathers" which we had watched just a few evenings earlier. Embedded in the story of that famous moment when soldiers planted an American flag on Iwo Jima during World War II, are gruesome scenes of killing and being killed. More than 60 years later, we look back on that war and tell ourselves it just had to be waged. Can we look at the ugly, bloody quagmires in Iraq and Afghanistan and say those, too, just had and have to be?

Considering our deepening and expanding awareness of all the wrongs we are doing to our Mother Earth, it is utterly weird that war is still acceptable not only to our so-called leaders but also to us bystanders who, it appears, feel obliged to help pay for the massive destruction and killing. Every bomb that's dropped hurts earth; cluster bombs do grave harm not only to current and future generations, but also the soil that has to sustain them; all fighter aircraft, all tanks, all rigs used for transportation – they all add big-time to climate change and thus do yet more harm to everything that lives on this our only livable planet.

The best way I can describe the crazier-than-crazy stupidity of it all is by quoting William Blum, author of Freeing the World to Death: Essays on the American Empire – "War licenses men to take part in what would otherwise be described as psychopathic behavior."

Louise Sandberg

Corinth







READER COMMENTS


"On another note, it is sad that people who consider themselves Conservatives, as I think Maloney, Perkins, and Hill do, support the biggest government program on Earth. It is sad that these people who claim to be against socialism are in fact war socialists..."

Well said. But its been said here many times to ZERO avail. These guys seem completely incapable of learning. Very sad.
-- Posted by Bennett Shapiro on Tue, Nov 24, 2009, 3:08 pm EST

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Just so ya know, Mr. West (if that's your real name!) I consider my self one of them there conservative Democrats..which means I'll hand out the help, if you'll work for it..
-- Posted by CJ maloney on Tue, Nov 24, 2009, 2:01 pm EST

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Louise Sandberg,

Great letter until the Mother Earth/Gaia stuff. This has nothing to do with global warming pseudoscience. Propaganda of Muslims hating us for our freedoms and scheming to take over our country and propaganda of oceans rising and the world dying a fiery death stem from the same tree. They, along with swine flu, are both manufactured crises, hobgoblins, designed. As in, "The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary."


On another note, it is sad that people who consider themselves Conservatives, as I think Maloney, Perkins, and Hill do, support the biggest government program on Earth. It is sad that these people who claim to be against socialism are in fact war socialists.

The argument goes something like this: government programs are completely inept, the government can't do anything right, they waste our money and kill our economy. Except for the Pentagon! And the CIA! And the armed forces! Why, they are spreading nothing but democracy abroad! The socialist government programs that kill brown people abroad in foreign lands are totally necessary!

And no, our imperial war machine with troops in 177 countries has nothing to do with national defense, or spreading democracy, or defending freedom. And no, we are no longer a free country, the best on Earth.

This is why I often refer to left-wing or liberal socialists and right-wing and conservative socialists. The only principled and consistent position is to be against both left-wing welfare socialism and right-wing war socialism.
-- Posted by Mr. West on Tue, Nov 24, 2009, 1:52 pm EST

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Olde Man,

We should hit em with a M.O.A.B. (Massive Ordinance Air Blast Bomb aka GBU-43/B aka Mother Of All Bombs). It is the largest non-nuclear bomb that we have shown the world. The Russians released their stronger version (the Father of all bombs) and the U.S. claims to have one even stronger but has not released it yet. It is something like half as powerful as the nuke we have today, but there is no nuclear fallout, just one really big bang. It should do the trick, you would only need a few as most people who witnessed it or survived in an area would not want to fight any more.....

ML
-- Posted by Jeff Perkins on Tue, Nov 24, 2009, 10:31 am EST

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Thanks, AJ. Have a great T-Day.
-- Posted by Jest Askin on Tue, Nov 24, 2009, 10:07 am EST

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Jest Askin -

You do know how to turn a phrase.
I definitely could not have put it better.
-- Posted by AJ None on Tue, Nov 24, 2009, 9:18 am EST

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Use nukes, it's quicker and less expensive.
-- Posted by Olde Man on Mon, Nov 23, 2009, 7:57 pm EST

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Ah yes, we've always had wars so ... we'll always have wars. Let's discourage finding ways of not killing each other. That's so un-American! Besides, war is great for business and the truly enlightened among us say that WWII is the real reason the US managed to escape from the Great Depression so ... it's all good!

So, take a war-monger to lunch today and on Thanksgiving Day, give thanks for all the religious fanatics of all types who are willing to send others to kill in our names.

I submit this prayer for your Thanksgiving Day table:

Dear Christian Brand God, we thank you for our superior firepower at waging the war of which we are absolutely sure You approve. Thank you for our ability to bring shock and awe to those who hide sleeplessly in their homes at night hoping to avoid being killed or captured and tortured for crimes they have not committed.

Please, Christian Brand God, bring Your blessings of victory to our liars and homicidal maniacs who send our young people to wage wars in Your name to kill people who send their young people to fight and die for You ... although they call You by another name (perhaps because they speak a different language?).

Whatever, we know we are right and they are wrong because You have granted us the superiority in firepower as we attempt to subdue the wrong-worshiping types and make them have the same type of government as ours and call You by Your correct name. Hey, either they covert or we bomb 'em to hell. Good plan, huh?

Hey, Sky Guy, the kings and princes and knights of the Middle Ages managed to slay the enemy in his land and we can do no less for You, Heavenly General, and for American business interests while we're at it. After all, we know you made a mistake by putting all that oil under their lands when You should have put it under ours - with all due respect of course. We forgive you Your trespasses into areas You do not understand- like defense industries, for instance - Great Spirit in the Sky who looks like a German in a bathrobe but who hails from the middle east. What's with that anyway, Holy Impostor?

And finally, Holy Battle Flag Carrier, please allow your emissary on earth, George W. Bush, to return to Your palace in Washington, DC, where he can bring about the Divine Apocalypse that you sent him to the Great White Cathedral to accomplish. He's a complete dope and a drug-abusing crackpot but he's obviously greatly favored by Your high priests and priestesses of the American Enterprise Institute and other neocon temples of madness ... er ... holiness. So, how about it? Can we count on You?

We ask this in the name of Saint Ronnie Reagan, amen.
-- Posted by Jest Askin on Mon, Nov 23, 2009, 1:07 pm EST

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Louise,

Stick your head back in the 60's and things will seem just fine. Wars were here before you and they will be here after you, just like Your "Mother Earth". Wake up people, this isn't about "territory" its about Religion, most wars are. They want to kill US and we want to survive, hmmmm....seems kind of familiar to the Nazi issue doesn't it. So let's just build a wall around our country and hope they don't knock it down....seemed to work for China.
-- Posted by Douglas Anthony on Mon, Nov 23, 2009, 8:43 am EST

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Hey, you forgot Kumbya...!
As far as posted goes, she actually wrote that and mailed it in..WITH her name. I don't have to agree with it, of course, but I gotta respect that.
-- Posted by CJ maloney on Mon, Nov 23, 2009, 8:31 am EST

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Ahhh yes, only in Vermont would the retrograde bong-water sentiments of the peacenik philosophy get posted on a newspaper site. Shall we all sing "Give Peace a Chance" now? Perhaps the "kindest" and most peaceful thing to do would be to give radical islam free reign to stone women, cut the limbs off of children and bomb the rest of us into rubble lots. Peace man, no flag or trumpet ever fed a child. The only good thing about this article is the evidence of typical leftist cannibalism beginning to take place. Feed, feed, feed.
-- Posted by James Hill on Mon, Nov 23, 2009, 7:24 am EST

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"The hypocrisy...of denouncing war while wanting to preserve that kind of society makes war inevitable."
George Orwell
-- Posted by CJ maloney on Mon, Nov 23, 2009, 5:45 am EST

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