From the 'does this seem like a good idea to you?' inbox, courtesy of Mother Jones:
This makes a lot of sense: "A decorated sergeant and Arabic language specialist was dismissed from the U.S. Army under the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy, though he says he never told his superiors he was gay and his accuser was never identified." Right, because the Army has way too many Arabic language specialists just sitting around...
Sound familiar? It should. In 2005, the military discharged 26 arab linguists for being gay. WTF? The military - as well as government in general - has had a bad habit of putting ideology before reality under this administration. I've said it before, but the right seems to think you get to choose what 'truths' you believe - even after those 'truths' have been disproven.
In this case, this total lack of logic could put the nation at risk. In fact, from global warming to neocon middle eastern theories to free market moonyism, this line of thinking has put the nation at risk.
The free market demanded we give over port security to nation that was home to two of the 9/11 hijackers and is the financial hub for al Qaeda. Despite the obvious fact that this was stupid, the 'genius of the free market' - that invisible, godlike, and mindless hand - showed it to be a great idea.
While the world simmers in record setting heat, global warming is just a 'theory'. Meanwhile, people die from heat in Europe and it's caused as many as 139 deaths in California alone.
The border war between Israel and Lebanon shows that the neocon theory that democracies don't go to war with each other is a bunch of bullshit.
Yet, the morons at the helm keep yelling, "Stay the course!" Long after everyone else has realized that 'the course' is straight into that big ol' honkin' iceberg, the right seems to think that if they just believe hard enough and keep doing what they're doing, the iceberg will melt away (although not from global warming - that's not real, remember).
So now, they've so convinced themselves that gays would be disruptive to the military that they're willing to disrupt the military to avoid the disruption. Yeah, doesn't make a damned bit of sense to me either.
--Wisco
1 comment:
I very much agree with you on the subject of gay translators. It's unfortunately not the stupidest thing the military has ever done, though.
However, I object to your opinion in the Dubai Ports debacle. I hate to say it, but it's the one policy Bush has had that I DIDN'T have (too) much of a problem with, for a few reasons:
a) It's not like the US was in control of the ports anyway, they were already in the hands of a British company.
b) Not to sound too libertarian, but do you really want the government in charge of them? My opinion of the government's ability to monitor ports is very low, given how badly they seem to govern everything else.
c) Inspection is the responsibility of the Coast Guard; it wouldn't have been in the Dubai company's hands anyway.
d) Lots of terrorists have been born in the US; just because some of the 9/11 terrorists were from Dubai doesn't mean all Dubai companies have terrorist ties.
e) The USA Today article you linked to just indicates that the Emerate's border policies are lax. Well, so are Canada's. Should we stop dealing with them?
There were many troubling aspects of the port deal, including lack of transperancy, the preferential treatment they were given by the Bush administration, the company's policy of not trading with Israel, not enough security measures being required, etc. In the end, that it fell through was for the best, but unfortunately made the US look bigoted against Arabs.
In summary, what I mean to say is, that there are way better examples of Bush administration policies not making any sense.
~A fellow Wisconsin democrat.
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