Tuesday, June 13, 2006

A New Number Two (But The Same Old Shit)

It didn't take long. In less than a week, a new leader was chosen for al-qaeda, which makes me wonder what kind of campaign process they must have. What, no mudslinging (Abdul gets his IED materials from Zionists!) or outlandish campaign promises (vote for me and I promise twice as many virgins when you die fighting the infidels!)? You'd think they'd be lining up for miles to be the point man for the US propaganda campaign against Islam.
But now the US has a new face and voice of Al Qaeda to put fear into the hearts and minds of the beer swilling flag waving chemically imbalanced brain damaged NASCAR watching monkeys before they had time to think "Well, we got Zarqawi, isn't it time to bring our troops home?" Even though most of the fighting between US troops and Iraqis involve the insurgency, the US makes no distinction between Al qaeda and the insurgency (just as it makes no distinction between combatants and civilians) . As long as they have a boogey man to wag at the people who'll make video and audio tapes to be released right before election time, everything's cool!
What this really points up is the futility of the currents strategy of the war on terrorism. Terrorists are like dandelions, mow one down and ten more pop up in their place. And, like dandelions, to get rid of terrorists, you have to get at the roots. But there is no intention of ending terrorism by the US, only exploiting it and defining every military action in the Middle east as part of "the war on terrorism", such as the impending war with Iran, as an excuse to establish a permanent military prescence in the region.
Which means that the war will go on for generations. Someday, you may be able to tell your grandchildren that you remember when we actually had the rights and freedoms that the troops are dying for overseas. And I'm more than certain there'll be a new number two al Qaeda guy.

10 comments:

Yukkione said...

But Lew, didnt you hear that we've killed or captured two thirds of the leadership? Come on get with the program.

Lew Scannon said...

So why are we still there? Oh yeah, that's right-the oil's still there.

Lily said...

Its getting pretty hard these days to get with the program. it seems the more "permanent" we want to be as a presence, the more the violence from the insurgency. Nice that they took out the language on spending related to a permanant base. Earl did a post about the conditions of bases we already have, too. in need of funding.

Anonymous said...

Two weeks to pick the new leader, but only 3 days for the gruesome beheadings to start again.

Sigh...

Kathy said...

I wish Michigan had a similar campaign process. Thanks to DeVos, Michigan is now in the middle of the longest and most expensive campaign in history.

Democracy - SOLD to the highest bidder.

Diane S. said...

Lew, I agree with you completely about the failure of our strategy in the war against terrorism. However, I'm uncertain what an effective strategy would look like. Can you elaborate some more on "getting to the root"? What if the root is bigotted hatred? How do you fight that?

Lew Scannon said...

Diane S,
uinfortunately, as we have been led to believe, the root is not bigoted hatred, rather it is a hatred of US foreign policy in the Middle East.

Anonymous said...

This morning on BBC (yeah, I listen to BBC) there was an interview with a US military "strategist" who described his view that anti-Americanism is just a propaganda idea put out by Al Qaeda and that the people really want us there and other countries are not really as critical as it seems.

Hmm. They can apparently make foreign governments all over the world say critical things just for their own gains..thats power!

Rex Kramer, Danger Seeker said...

Number 2?

As I so eloquently pointed out today at the hacker-infested The Blue Republic, there is no #1!

(Yes, I just blog-whored.)

Lew Scannon said...

Yeah, I would have read it, but I seem to have troubles accessing TBR. And I need my Sunday morinig Leftist Belle.