AL QAEDA & MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD Regaining Control Of The MIDDLE EAST (They Are NOT "On The Run"!)

#ALQAEDA

AL QAEDA & the MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD is gaining Strength in the MIDDLE EAST.

I thought in 2012 while on the campaign trail Pres OBAMA claimed "AL QAEDA was on the run".





ARTICLE: "The Muslim Brotherhood, Back In A Fight To Survive"


They hide in safe houses on the outskirts of this city, talk only fleetingly on cellphones and avoid the cafes where they used to meet. Heavy scarves obscure their identities when they venture out to join protests.


The leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood, now outlawed, have adjusted to life underground, even while hundreds of their fellow members have been arrested in this city since the military deposed President Mohamed Morsi, a Brotherhood leader, and the Egyptian government branded the group a terrorist movement.

Yet, rather than crack and disintegrate under the pressure, members say, the group has fallen back on the organizational structure that sustained it for decades as a banned and secretive movement. It is becoming more decentralized, but also more cohesive and rigid, as its members abandon activities like preaching and social work and shift their attention to a virtually singular goal: resistance to the military-backed government.

Their focus, many Brotherhood members say, is a protracted, grinding struggle.

“There is a vision of a political confrontation that can go on for years,” said one leader, a 33-year-old architect in Fayoum, an Islamist stronghold. He, along with other members, spoke in a cafe for a time, but changed locations after suspecting the employees were eavesdropping.

“This is our persistence stage,” he said. “We are trying to stand up as long as we can.”

The Brotherhood’s endurance so far all but ensures that Egypt will continue to be troubled by civil conflict. And it raises further doubts about the government’s attempts to extinguish a movement that has resisted such efforts since its founding more than 80 years ago and that draws support from hundreds of thousands of members and millions of affiliates and sympathizers throughout the country.

Although leaders of the group say they remain committed to protests to express their activism, some members said that many of its sympathizers were increasingly talking of violence.

“I know people who are not Muslim brothers who say, ‘We’ll get your rights back for you,’ ” said Ramadan Fadel, a 27-year-old member in Fayoum who said that an acquaintance had told him that people were ready to take up arms to protect the group.

In places like Mansoura, north of Cairo, where the Brotherhood’s footprint is smaller, there was less talk of confrontation than of survival, beginning with the difficulty of attracting new recruits. “Who would want to undergo this repression?” asked a doctor who lives just outside the city and who wanted to remain anonymous for fear of reprisals.

Some members described the conflict as a zero-sum game between the military and the Brotherhood. Underscoring the perils of that conflict, at least 13 people were killed on Friday during Brotherhood marches throughout the country in some of the deadliest clashes in months.

“Our backs are against the wall,” the doctor said. The military, he added, “has left us only one path.”

After the ouster of Mr. Morsi, the few government ministers who spoke of reconciliation complained that the Brotherhood was unyielding in its demands, even as hard-liners escalated a crackdown on the movement, killing hundreds of protesters and imprisoning almost every senior leader. Now the hawks are ascendant, no one talks of compromise and officials openly accuse the Brotherhood of carrying out deadly and spectacular attacks on the security services, even when unrelated militant groups claim responsibility for such attacks.

Last week, for instance, Interior Minister Mohamed Ibrahim, a government hard-liner, accused the Brotherhood of conspiring to carry out “hostile schemes” over the years with “extremist factions,” including Palestinian militants.

In reality, though, the roots of the government’s problems are much closer to home.

In cities like Mansoura, the doctor said, members have continued to attend the small, weekly “family” meetings that are considered the most critical building blocks of the organization, and the wellspring of the brotherhood’s cohesion and its ideology.

In many neighborhoods in Fayoum, campaign posters for Mr. Morsi still hang on the walls, evidence of the futility of the government’s campaign, Brotherhood members say.

For now, Brotherhood members in Fayoum said they were concentrating on replenishing their ranks, reaching out to new recruits while trying to coax lapsed, older members into more active service. Four of the members, including a senior leader, detailed the movement’s strategy, speaking on the condition of anonymity because they feared drawing further attention from the authorities.

Efforts to keep the movement alive began after Mr. Morsi’s ouster in July, the members said, when leaders appointed deputies, who in turn appointed their own deputies, to ensure a continuity of leadership as the crackdown on protests intensified. As thousands of Islamists from across the country demonstrated in Cairo for the return of Mr. Morsi, meetings were held in the squares where the protests occurred, near the Rabaa al-Adawiya mosque and at Cairo University.

When the authorities stormed the squares on Aug. 14, killing hundreds of protesters, the Brotherhood faced its greatest organizational crisis, the members said. “It took about 15 days to absorb the shock, and get back to our grass roots,” said one member, a 26-year-old veterinarian. “Now we’re expanding.”

Still, a growing pressure on the Brotherhood has forced adjustments. Meetings are now held in private homes, and members approach security checkpoints and attend protests assuming they will be arrested. Some of the protests have become more like flash mobs, with demonstrators scattering quickly to avoid a heavy security response.

Some of the older Brotherhood leaders, for whom living under repression had become a way of life, boasted about the movement’s tenacity.

But for younger members, facing the wrath of the state was still a shock. Mr. Fadel, the 27-year-old, said he had become terrified of being singled out as a member of the Brotherhood by people on the street. His family has also pressured him to leave the movement.

Having been wounded by birdshot during protests, he said, he had prepared himself for the likelihood that he would be killed. “For now I see no future,” he said. “I fear for my family.”

With the group’s narrow focus on survival, there was little talk about the long-term direction of the movement, or the mistakes during Mr. Morsi’s time in power, a tenure that ended with millions of angry Egyptians on the streets demanding his ouster. The Brotherhood members talked about a few “errors” but mostly complained about what they said were conspiracies that doomed their rule.

Their official demand, that the military takeover be reversed, has not changed since July. On the horizon were nothing but protests and some unspecified type of resistance that the leaders in Fayoum promised to unveil on Jan. 25, the anniversary of the 2011 uprising against President Hosni Mubarak.

In Mansoura, where a bombing last month was followed by retaliatory violence against the Brotherhood, the members of the movement have faced greater difficulties. The doctor said he and other members had learned to live by new rules.

“Don’t stand in the street together for too long,” the doctor said. “If you have money, gold or documents that are important for you or the Muslim Brotherhood, take them to a relative or a friend you trust.”

“We’re now placed in the same boat,” he said. “We must be tighter together than we were before, so the crisis passes.”


Sources: Fox News, NY Times, Youtube

Robert Bales & Abel Gutierrez Being Unfairly Judged By Media: PTSD & War Vets

I am Not Opposed to War.
Instead I am Opposed to Unnecessary Wars. i.e., Iraq & Afghanistan, Vietnam, Bay of Pigs.

Staff Sgt. Robert Bales served in Iraq & Afghanistan. He Suffered from Severe PTSD as a Result of 4 Deployments, Brain & Foot Injuries. Part of his foot had to be amputated.

It is believed Bales recently Killed 16 Afghan Civilians while on Duty at an Outpost Base in Afghanistan.

Abel Gutierrez was also an Iraq War Veteran. He also Suffered from Severe PTSD.

Gutierrez recently Murdered his 11-Yr old Sister, Mother than Committed Suicide.

After Selfless Sacrifice & laying their lives on the line for ALL American Citizens, Men like Staff Sgt. Robert Bales & Abel Gutierrez are now being Unfairly Judged by people in the Media who NEVER served one day in the U.S. Military or in a Combat Zone.

Whatever happened to Patriotism?
Where is the Gratitude for our Men & Women who Serve in the U.S. Military?

I believe Bales is being Unfairly Judged because some people within the Federal Gov't want to use him as an Example to prove something to Afghanistan President Karzai.

Gutierrez is being Unfairly Judged because he's Hispanic, plain & simple.

This Troubles Me Immensely!

Its another Vietnam all over again.

After Drafting American Males ages 17 to 35, then Sending them to War to Vietnam & Cuba, upon their return they were treated like DIRT!

Although the Men & Women serving in the 21st Century U.S. Military were NOT Drafted they still served their Country.

Yet they are being treated like DIRT!

Thousands of Men & Women are returning home from Iraq & Afghanistan, Suffering from PTSD, yet the Federal Gov’t is Refusing to Treat them or Give them Disability Benefits.

This is NOT right!

Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome is NOT some Phony Illness Human Beings can just make up out of the blue to receive Government Checks.

Its a REAL Mental & Physical Disease caused by Shock & Trauma.

PTSD is Not a New Mental Disease.

The Federal Gov't (Pentagon, CIA) has known about PTSD & and it affects on Soldiers for decades.

Men who served in World War 2, Vietnam & in the Bay Of Pig Wars All Suffered from PTSD.

So why is the Military & Federal Gov't choosing NOT to provide Proper Treatment & Counseling for Men & Women Suffering from this Illness?

Is it about Money or Saving Human Lives from Suicide?

What's worth more?

Providing Proper Treatment & Disability Checks until these Soldiers are Well enough to continue living Normal Lives or....

Suicide???

In fact, whenever a Service Member Suffering from PTSD Commits Suicide, the Federal Gov’t does NOT want to give their Survivors Life Insurance Money.
This is NOT right either.

As the 2012 Elections approach, Our Service Members are even being used as Pawns to help win those Elections.

Let's Please Continue Praying For Our Men & Women Serving In The U.S. Military.


Friends praise Sgt. Bales, but his past is dark


Bypassed for a promotion and struggling to pay for his house, Robert Bales was eyeing a way out of his job at a Washington state military base months before he allegedly gunned down 16 civilians in an Afghan war zone, records and interviews showed as a deeper picture emerged Saturday of the Army sergeant's financial troubles and brushes with the law.

While Bales, 38, sat in an isolated cell at Fort Leavenworth, Kan.'s military prison Saturday, classmates and neighbors from suburban Cincinnati, Ohio, remembered him as a "happy-go-lucky" high school football player who took care of a special needs child and watched out for troublemakers in the neighborhood.

CBS News correspondent White Johnson reports that, in Lake Tapps, Wash., where he and his family have a home, neighbors still can't believe the 11-year veteran is accused of mass murder.

"I'm shocked. I'm completely shocked," said Kassie Holland. "He was always happy. Happy guy, full of life. I really wouldn't expect it."

"A good guy, got put in the wrong place at the wrong time," said Paul Wohlberg.

But court records and interviews show that the Army veteran -- with a string of commendations for good conduct after four tours in Iraq and Afghanistan -- had joined the Army after a Florida investment job went sour, had a Seattle-area home condemned, struggled to make payments on another and failed to get a promotion or a transfer a year ago.

His legal troubles included charges that he assaulted a girlfriend and, in a hit-and run accident, ran bleeding in military clothes into the woods, court records show. He told police he fell asleep at the wheel and paid a fine to get the charges dismissed, the records show.

Military officials say that after drinking on a southern Afghanistan base, Bales crept away on March 11 to two slumbering villages overnight, shooting his victims and setting many of them on fire. Nine of the 16 killed were children and 11 belonged to one family.

"This is some crazy stuff if it's true," Steve Berling, a high school classmate, said of the revelations about the father of two known as "Bobby" in his hometown of Norwood, Ohio.

Bales hasn't been charged yet in the shootings, which have endangered complicated relations between the U.S. and Afghanistan and threatened to upend U.S. policy over the decade-old war.

His former platoon leader said Saturday Bales was a model soldier inspired by 9/11 to serve who saved lives in firefights on his second of three Iraq missions.

"He's one of the best guys I ever worked with," said Army Capt. Chris Alexander, who led Bales on a 15-month deployment in Iraq.

"He is not some psychopath. He's an outstanding soldier who has given a lot for this country."

But pressing family troubles were hinted at by his wife, Kari, on multiple blogs posted with names like The Bales Family Adventures and BabyBales. A year ago, she wrote that Bales was hoping for a promotion or a transfer after nine years stationed at Joint Base Lewis-McChord outside Tacoma, Wash.

"We are hoping to have as much control as possible" over the future, Kari Bales wrote last March 25. "Who knows where we will end up. I just hope that we are able to rent our house so that we can keep it. I think we are both still in shock."

After Bales lost out on a promotion to E7 -- a first-class sergeant -- the family hoped to go to either Germany, Italy or Hawaii for an "adventure," she said. They hoped to move by last summer; instead the Army redeployed his unit -- the 2nd Infantry Division of the 3rd Stryker Brigade, named after armored Stryker vehicles -- to Afghanistan.

It would be Bales' fourth tour in a war zone. He joined the military two months after 9/11 and spent more than three years in Iraq during three separate assignments since 2003. His attorney said he was injured twice in Iraq -- once losing part of his foot -- but his 20 or so commendations do not include the Purple Heart, given to soldiers wounded in combat.

Alexander said Bales wasn't injured while he oversaw him during their deployment -- Bales' second in Iraq. He called Bales a "very solid" officer who didn't have more difficulty than his fellow soldiers with battlefield stress. Bales shot at a man aiming a rocket-propelled grenade at his platoon's vehicle in Mosul, Iraq, sending the grenade flying over the vehicle.

"There's no doubt he saved lives that day," Alexander said. The charges he killed civilians is "100 percent out of character for him," he said.

Bales always loved the military and war history, even as a teenager, said Berling, who played football with him in the early 1990s on a team that included Marc Edwards, a future NFL player and Super Bowl champion with the New England Patriots.

"I remember him and the teacher just going back and forth on something like talking about the details of the Battle of Bunker Hill," he said. "He knew history, all the wars."

Bales exulted in the role once he finally achieved it. Plunged into battle in Iraq, he told an interviewer for a Fort Lewis base newspaper in 2009 that he and his comrades proved "the real difference between being an American as opposed to being a bad guy."

Bales joined the Army, Berling said, after studying business at Ohio State University -- he attended three years but didn't graduate -- and handled investments before the market downturn pushed him out of the business. Florida records show that Bales was a director at an inactive company called Spartina Investments Inc. in Doral, Fla.; his brother, Mark Bales, and a Mark Edwards were also listed as directors.

"I guess he didn't like it when people lost money," Berling said.

He was struggling to keep payments on his own home in Lake Tapps, a rural reservoir community about 35 miles south of Seattle; his wife asked to put the house on the market three days before the shootings, real estate Philip Rodocker said.

"She told him she was behind in our payments," Rodocker told The New York Times. "She said he was on his fourth tour and it was getting kind of old and they needed to stabilize their finances."

The house was not officially put on the market until Monday; on Tuesday, Rodocker said, Bales' wife called and asked to take the house off the market, talking of a family emergency.

Bales and his wife bought the Lake Tapps home in 2005, according to records, for $280,000; it was listed this week at $229,000. Overflowing boxes were piled on the front porch, and a U.S. flag leaned against the siding.

The sale may have been a sign of financial troubles. Bales and his wife also own a home in Auburn, about 10 miles north, according to county records, but abandoned it about two years ago, homeowners' association president Bob Baggett said. Now signs posted on the front door and window by the city warn against occupying the house.

"It was ramshackled," Baggett said. "They were not dependable. When they left there were vehicles parts left on the front yard...we'd given up on the owners."

The diverging portrait of the sergeant rippled across the country on Saturday.

"It's our Bobby. He was the local hero," said Michael Blevins, who grew up down the street from him in Norwood, Ohio. The youngest of five boys respected older residents, admonished troublemakers and loved children, even helping another boy in the area who had special needs.

In Washington state, court records showed a 2002 arrest for assault on a girlfriend. Bales pleaded not guilty and was required to undergo 20 hours of anger management counseling, after which the case was dismissed.

A separate hit-and-run charge was dismissed in Sumner, Wash.'s municipal court three years ago, according to records. It isn't clear from court documents what Bales hit; witnesses saw a man in a military-style uniform, with a shaved head and bleeding, running away.

When deputies found him in the woods, Bales told them he fell asleep at the wheel. He paid about $1,000 in fines and restitution and the case was dismissed in October 2009.

Dan Conway, a military attorney who represented one of four Lewis-McChord soldiers convicted in the deliberate killings of three Afghan civilians in 2010, said whether legal scrapes affect a soldier's career depends in part on whether they prompt the Army to issue administrative penalties. The punishments are typically recorded in official personnel files.

Over the past decade, Conway said, the military has sometimes been lax in administering such punishments. As a result, soldiers who might be bad apples sometimes remain in service longer than they otherwise might have.

"It's something you want to note," Conway said. "The best predictor of future violence is past violence."

Bales' lawyer, John Henry Browne of Seattle, said he didn't know if his client had been suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder at the time of the shootings, but said it could be an issue at trial if experts believe it's relevant.

He also said Friday he didn't know if his client had been drinking the night of the massacre. Browne didn't return telephone calls on Saturday. His legal team has said Browne will be meeting with Bales at Fort Leavenworth next week.


View Larger Map


Sources: AP, ABC News, CBS News, Daily Mail, Google Maps

Karzai Calls U.S. Troops "Demons" & Wants Them Out NOW! McCain Wants Them To Stay! Why?

Karzai is now calling U.S. Troops "Demons"! So why is Obama choosing to keep Our Troops there after Bin Laden's Death?
Because GOP Senators like John McCain & Mitch McConnell want this War to last FOREVER!

Pres. Obama knows its very likely he Will be Re-elected this Fall.

He also knows that due to being Outspent by Super Wealthy GOP Supporters, its very likely the GOP will soon be in Control of Both Chambers of Congress.

From January 2009 to November 2010, Democrats were in Complete Control of Congress.

But instead of tackling Employment Discrimination against BLACKS & Latinos, they became Complacent and Focused Solely on Gay Rights & Health Care.

Now in 2012, Millions of BLACK & Latino Citizens are Financially Ill-equipped to Donate to Pres. Obama's Campaign as most of them did in 2008.

So how is Pres. Obama positioning himself Politically?

Pres. Barack Obama is positioning himself so he will be able to Govern with a GOP-Controlled Congress.

This might explain why he has changed his mind about pulling out U.S. Troops from Afghanistan in 2014 instead of 2013 as he stated last year.

Just watch.









Gulf Widens Between U.S. and a More Volatile Karzai


The Americans in Afghanistan are “demons.”

They claim they burned Korans by mistake, but really those were “Satanic acts that will never be forgiven by apologies.”

The massacre of 16 Afghan children, women and men by an American soldier “was not the first incident, indeed it was the 100th, the 200th and 500th incident.”

Such harsh talk may sound as if it comes from the Taliban, but those are all remarks either made personally by the United States’ increasingly hostile ally here, President Hamid Karzai, or issued by his office in recent days and weeks.

The strongest such outburst came Friday. “Let’s pray for God to rescue us from these two demons,” Mr. Karzai said, apparently holding back tears at a meeting with relatives of the massacre victims, and clearly referring to the United States and the Taliban in the same breath. “There are two demons in our country now.”

Ever since the Koran-burning episode on Feb. 20 and its violent aftermath, the relationship between the two governments has lurched from one crisis to another. American officials have scrambled to run damage control, with President Obama expressing a personal apology for the Koran burning, as well as regrets about the massacre, while calling Mr. Karzai twice in the past week.

The White House went to lengths last week to depict Mr. Karzai’s call for Americans to hand over control a year earlier, by 2013, as no change in policy — only to have Mr. Karzai pointedly insist the next day that it was. The Americans fret that Mr. Karzai is making a difficult job almost impossible, with demands they often see as unreasonable; Mr. Karzai worries that the Americans seek to undermine him, and may yet abandon his country and him, once again, to their fate.

The Koran burnings brought these differences into sharp relief, and led to a rupture in trust some view as irreparable. After an American unit at Bagram Air Base inadvertently burned Korans, embassy officials were deeply worried about an investigation conducted by the country’s Ulema Council, its highest religious body.

The council’s pronouncements, however, are closely controlled by Mr. Karzai’s office — they are even issued by the presidential palace — and American officials were assured by senior members on the president’s staff that the council’s report would be tough but not incendiary.

“We were ready to get knocked a bit,” said an American official who asked not to be identified to preserve his relationship with Afghan officials. “We messed up pretty badly.”

The original draft, in fact, was relatively moderate, American and Afghan officials said. But at the last minute more hard-line elements of Mr. Karzai’s staff weighed in, and the joint statement finally issued by the Ulema Council and the palace used language like “Satanic act” and “unforgivable, wild and inhuman” about the book burnings, and “justifiable emotion” in regard to the violent reaction, which claimed the lives of at least 29 Afghans and 6 Americans.

Western diplomats have often viewed Mr. Karzai’s outbursts as playing to the galleries, meant for consumption by his own people only, not as serious statements of policy. But the galleries also include the public in the United States and its NATO allies, where majorities in nearly every country oppose remaining in Afghanistan, and every new contretemps risks further eroding an already tenuous support.

“I think this is very serious because Mr. Karzai has always had a very ambivalent attitude toward the West and toward the war — he has never really believed violence is the answer,” said Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles, the British ambassador to Afghanistan from 2007 through 2009. “He is also very conscious and very resentful that his political survival and even perhaps his personal safety depend on the Americans.”

The current American ambassador, the veteran diplomat Ryan C. Crocker, was brought out of semiretirement by President Obama last July at least in part because he had known Mr. Karzai since the beginning: Mr. Crocker was the first envoy to Afghanistan after the invasion that defeated the Taliban, when Mr. Karzai was appointed interim leader here.

Like many of his predecessors, Mr. Crocker began his latest tour on an optimistic note. “President Karzai has the toughest job in the world, and he has been doing it for the last 10 years,” Mr. Crocker said early on, and has repeated often since. “You have to give him credit.”

While the two men still have a working relationship and meet often, according to aides to both, there are many signs that the warmth has gone out of that relationship once again.

Mr. Crocker insisted in an interview with PBS on Friday that this was not the case.

“I think he is a committed Afghan nationalist, that at the end of the day he seeks the same goals we do,” the ambassador said. “And sometimes the rhetoric gets a little heated. Sometimes my rhetoric has been known to get a little bit heated in a few of these meetings, and then I go sit under a tree and think about the larger equities at stake, and we move on.”

From Mr. Karzai’s point of view, the Americans have repeatedly defied his demands to end commando night raids, and one civilian casualty after another has put him in the position of either criticizing the Americans and angering them, or not criticizing them and angering Afghans.

“In any relationship there are things that one party does that the other party doesn’t particularly care for, and that goes both ways,” said James Cunningham, the deputy ambassador to Afghanistan. “The question is not just whether President Karzai is a partner; we’re discussing and putting into place a partnership that is going to look forward a decade or so, and that’s a partnership with Afghanistan and its leaders, whoever they are.”

The relationship is so frayed, however, that Mr. Karzai often is quick to view everything through the prism of presumed American perfidy.

When American diplomats meet with his political opponents, he sees it as a sign that they are out to topple him from power — something that has reportedly obsessed him ever since the presidential election in 2009, which the international community saw as widely fraudulent. American officials pressured him into agreeing to a runoff, which in the end his opponents refused.

“We don’t have to be here running Afghanistan, and that is what people are afraid of,” Mr. Cunningham said. “We are not running Afghanistan, we are easing our way out, and I think that’s what feeds this whole dynamic. The notion that somehow we hold the upper hand, that’s not the right way to look at what we are trying to arrange. We are really, actually trying to arrange a partnership in which Afghans run their affairs,” he said.

The Taliban routinely deride Mr. Karzai as nothing more than an American puppet, but that is certainly not the view of his purported puppet masters. “Never in history has any superpower spent so much money, sent so many troops to a country, and had so little influence over what its president says and does,” one European diplomat marveled.

Americans have, however, wielded influence on many occasions, and President Karzai is still smarting from many of them. When an aide to Mr. Karzai was arrested by an American-backed corruption task force, the president intervened to secure his release, and then eviscerated the anticorruption body, the Major Crimes Task Force. But from Mr. Karzai’s point of view, the Americans never gave him the courtesy of warning that they planned to arrest a top official.

Bette Dam, a Dutch author who interviewed Mr. Karzai extensively for her book, “Expedition Uruzgan: Hamid Karzai’s Journey Into the Palace,” says that what the Americans saw as corruption, Mr. Karzai and his family saw as simply patronage. Because the government was weak, with the Americans providing all the muscle, patronage was the only thing Mr. Karzai had to maintain his power base.

“Then you have President Obama, who says we have to do it differently. But the only thing that changed was Obama criticizing Karzai, making his government transparent, setting up task forces openly attacking his corruption,” she said. “It was not likely something would change; Karzai’s patronage system that was built up was too strong, and he himself too proud.”

The inquiry over the apparent embezzlement of nearly a billion dollars from Kabul Bank, which implicated Mr. Karzai’s brother and the brother of his first vice president, was deeply embarrassing, and he blamed American officials for leaking it to the press — and then using the threat of aid cuts to force him to dismember the bank.

From the point of view of the United States and its Western allies, they have only been trying to push Mr. Karzai to do the right thing. The Kabul Bank swindle was so notorious that it risked chasing away foreign aid donors.

From either perspective, it is a less-than-ideal situation — but the Americans have no alternative to Mr. Karzai, and Mr. Karzai has no alternative to the American-led coalition supporting him.

“The Americans are prepared to walk away,” said a senior Western official in Kabul. “And you’ve got an Afghan political establishment that is heavily dependent on the international presence. It’s a dynamic that is very unfortunate.”

“Karzai wants revenge on the U.S. because of the systematic insults he has suffered, that he feels his family suffered, because of Kabul Bank,” said a former Afghan government official. “The culture in the U.S. is about policy, it is about mutually rational interests. Revenge is at times more important in this part of the world, more important than any political or economic interest.”


View Larger Map


Sources: CNN, Daily Mail, NY Times, PBS, Russia Today, Wikipedia, Youtube, Google Maps

Afghan & Iraq Vets Still Suffer In Silence From PTSD: "Happy New Year" Film Provides Insight

"The War Does NOT End When We Say Its Over. For Many The War Just Begins. To All The Veterans. Thank You For Your Service."
Patrick Kennedy


Via a Mandatory Draft I want EVERY Federal Gov't Official including Congress Members & Pentagon Officials, to immediately allow their Adult Sons & Daughters to fight in the Afghan War to help Defend Karzai's (Afghan President) Corrupt Government, then tell me its Wise Foreign Policy” for U.S. Troops to remain in that region of the world.

War Is Hell!

God Bless Our Men & Women Who Serve This Country Via the U.S. Military!





The movie ‘Happy New Year’ depicts how war vets deal with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder


For many, the issue of post traumatic stress disorder among war veterans is an uncomfortable one, even taboo. But that hasn’t stopped writer/director K. Lorrel Manning from tackling its complexities in the movie, Happy New Year.

“A lot of men and women are suffering in silence,” said Manning. “It takes tragedies like what happened in Afghanistan for people to start talking about it.”

Indeed, the massacre of 16 Afghan civilians allegedly at the hands of a U.S. soldier is forcing a public dialogue. Manning is hoping his movie can keep the momentum going.

The Directors Guild of America in Manhattan is hosting a special benefit screening of Happy New Year Thursday. Proceeds will fund a PTSD facility in Israel.

The movie, filmed at the Bronx Psychiatric Center, follows two friends who served together in Iraq who are reunited at a veterans’ facility on New Year’s Eve.

The idea came to Manning over time but started in 2004 when he read the book, “Purple Hearts: Back from Iraq.”

“I wasn’t really following the war effort at that point but I couldn’t put this book down,” he said. “It changed my life.”

Later, while doing another project in Chicago, he met a police officer who was an Iraq war veteran, and their conversations lit a spark.

Manning wrote a one-act play and asked his friend Michael Cuomo to play the lead role.

That play evolved into a short film, then the opportunity came to make a feature-length film.

Neither Manning nor Cuomo have served in the military. To tell the story accurately, they spent nine months interviewing 80 veterans from various wars.

To prepare for his role as Staff Sgt. Cole Lewis, Cuomo spent four weeks in a simulated boot camp with a drill instructor and used a wheelchair for a month (his character is paralyzed from the waist down).

“I would wheel around the city at night, kind of incognito,” he said. “I wanted to feel what it was like to see the world from that position and feel how the world sees you.”

While the subject matter may be difficult, even off-putting for some, Cuomo believes there are people willing to put aside their personal politics and focus on the humanity in the story.

“The idea of thinking that your life is heading in a certain direction, then experiencing something catastrophic that changes your course, and how you deal with that, is a dynamic I think anyone can relate to,” he said.

Happy New Year has been well received at 16 film festivals nationwide, picking up some notable endorsements along the way.

Among its fans is retired Army Col. Jack Jacobs, who received the Congressional Medal of Honor for his heroism in Vietnam.

“I’m a career soldier so I’m invariably not happy with war movies,” he said. “(But) I was absolutely enraptured by Happy New Year because the characters seemed so real. I knew all of them.

“It’s a really moving piece,” Jacobs continued. “It’s hard to say you enjoyed something that actually causes you a little bit of pain, but I absolutely enjoyed it.”

For more information about the Happy New Year screening, call (212) 586-4034.


View Larger Map


Sources: AP, NY Daily News, Russia Today, Wikipedia, Youtube, Google Maps

Obama Stresses American Nation Building & Manufacturing Jobs (Weekly Address)

Obama: Invest in manufacturing


In his weekly address to the nation, President Barack Obama called on Americans to invest in the manufacturing industry, calling it a necessary step for spurring job creation and economic growth.

Speaking from Pittsburgh’s Carnegie Mellon University, which he visited Friday, Obama began by making the case that his plan to withdraw 33,000 troops from Afghanistan by summer 2012 — which he announced in a speech to the nation Wednesday — is not only in the best interest of U.S. security but also a smart move for the economy.

But turning the economy in the right direction is not enough, Obama said. “Many Americans are still hurting, and now is the time to focus on nation building here at home.”

Obama maintained that the economy can’t be fixed through spending cuts alone. He advocated investments in areas like education, infrastructure, clean energy and research and development in a bid to create middle-class jobs.

The president touted the accomplishments of a company called RedZone Robotics in developing advanced manufacturing techniques. “The folks at RedZone aren’t just solving problems; they’re working with unions to create new jobs operating the robots, and they’re saving cities millions of dollars in infrastructure costs,” he said.

On Friday, Obama launched the Advanced Manufacturing Partnership, which aims to bring together the manufacturing industry, universities and the government. According to the White House, more than $500 million will be invested in the program, which was created from recommendations made by the president’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.

In the weekly address, Obama said the partnership has a broader mission than to create jobs. “It’s to renew the promise of American manufacturing,” he said. “To help make sure America remains in this century what we were in the last — a country that makes things. A country that out-builds and out-innovates the rest of the world.”

To the workers and families struggling to make ends meet, the president said he felt hopeful seeing companies like RedZone in Pittsburgh, which he said developed from a small school to a global university.

“We are a people who’ve always adapted to meet the challenges of a new time; who’ve always shaped our own destiny, and I’m absolutely confident that that’s what we’re going to do one more time.”


Sources: Business Insider, Politico, White House.gov, Youtube

Karzai Celebrates Obama's U.S. Troops Withdrawal Plan (Of Course!)

After Becoming Super Rich Via G. W. Bush's "War On Terror" Profiteering Scheme, Of Course Karzai Is Happy To See American Troops Leave.

Now He Can Continue His Narcotics Trade Without Interruptions.

Yes Its Definitely Time To Bring Our Troops Home!!

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Karzai welcomes U.S. troop withdrawal

Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Thursday welcomed U.S. President Barack Obama's plans for a U.S. troops drawdown and said it's a sign that Afghanistan is ready to take control of security in the war-torn nation.

"The number of troops that he has announced to be withdrawn is a sign that Afghanistan is taking over its own security and is trying to defend its territory by its own means," Karzai said. "So we are happy about the announcement."

As the United States pulls back, Karzai painted a picture of a more stable Afghanistan, despite the fact that May was the bloodiest month for Afghan civilians since 2007. He told CNN's Fareed Zakaria in an interview set to air Sunday that Afghans were ready to take the reins of their own country.

"It is the responsibility of the Afghan people to protect their country and to provide security for the citizens of the country," Karzai said. "If you fail in fulfilling our most important responsibility with regard to our country and our people, then somebody else should take over."

Obama announced Wednesday night that 10,000 U.S. troops would leave Afghanistan this year and all 33,000 forces sent as part of a 2009 surge would return home by the summer of 2012.

Karzai also defended his public criticisms of NATO, which in recent weeks have taken on a more angry tone. Karzai blasted the alliance for civilian deaths and nighttime raids. He said his comment on NATO becoming an "occupying force" was taken out of context.

"No, I don't regret having made that comment," he said. "That comment was not seen in the full sentence that I spoke. It was after the incident of civilian casualties in Afghanistan where children were killed in an aerial bombing, where I said, 'No more of such aerial bombings on our residents.'

"The question was what if they continue?" Karzai said.

"When Afghanistan asks that these operations cease and even then, if they continue, this means we are not in charge of our country," he said. "And that, of course, becomes an occupation. It was in this context that I spoke, and I stand by that."

Karzai stressed regional cooperation between his homeland and neighboring Pakistan and India in the fight to bring an end to many years of conflict. He said the United States and Afghanistan's other allies could do a lot more in expediting talks with the Taliban to put an end to the violence.

"My statements are neither hostile nor inflammatory nor designed to get anything but an understanding from our partners that the Afghan people need to feel secure, they need to see this war take a direction in which they can see the end of the tunnel," Karzai said.

He said Afghanistan, dependent on U.S. dollars for security and development, was grateful to American taxpayers, but expressed dismay that U.S. humanitarian efforts have not always taken Afghan wishes into account.

He cited a Kandahar electricity project in which he said the United States spent $250 million to buy generators. Karzai said Afghanistan would have preferred the construction of a dam, which he called a more lasting solution.


View Larger Map


Sources: CNN, Guardian.co.uk, MSNBC, NY Times, Raw Story, Youtube, Google Maps

Obama's Troop Withdrawal Plan Ends Bush's "War On Terror" PROFITEERING!!

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Last Night The Entire World Listened As Pres. Barack Obama Announced What Could Be Considered An End To Bush's Fake "War On Terror" Era.

Our Troops Are Finally Coming Home!! Thank God!

Perhaps Not All At Once, Which Is Unrealistic But At Least They Are Finally Moving Out Of Iraq, Afghanistan & Pakistan Heading Back To American Soil.

Hopefully For Good!

Do I Agree With Progressives That Pres. Obama's Afghan Troop Withdrawal Plan Should Be More Aggressive?

Yes!

However I Do Still Give Him Credit For Keeping His Word Regarding The Timeline To Begin Withdrawing U.S. Troops From Afghanistan.

For All The Skeptics Of Obama's Afghan Troop Withdrawal Plan, Here's Something Crucial To Consider.

If It Were Up To A Republican President, The Idea Of A Troop Withdrawal Plan Would NEVER Have Been Discussed!

And Why Should It?

Why Discuss An Afghan Troop Withdrawal Plan If Hundreds Of GOP Leaders On Capitol Hill Are Earning Million$ Each Year From Oil Interests & If Millions Of Dollar$ Are Being Donated To GOP Campaign Pots From Super Wealthy, NO Tax Paying Government Contractors Friends?

i.e., War PROFITEERING!!

That's Right! I Said It!

Many GOP Leaders & Friends Of GOP Leaders Have Become Millionaires From Bush's "War On Terror" PROFITEERING!!

Now Do You Understand Why Most GOP Leaders & Pentagon Generals NEVER Want U.S. Troops To Leave Iraq, Afghanistan & Pakistan?? NOT Ever??

Its ALL About Oil Interests & Government Contractor PROFITEERING!

NOT National Security Or World Peace!

Thank The Good Lord Pres. Obama Genuinely Does Care About National Security & World Peace.

I Also Thank God Pres. Obama Wants To STOP Throwing U.S. Dollars To The Wind Overseas By Placing Billion$ Of Taxpayer Money Into The Hands Of Corrupt Middle East Leaders.

Real FREEDOM & Democracy Can NOT Be Purchased!

If Karzai (Afghanistan) & Zardari (Pakistan) REALLY Want Their Nations To Experience Some level Of Democracy, Let Them Use Their OWN Money & Troops To Do It!


Once Again I Am NOT Opposed To U.S. Forces Being Deployed After Osama Bin Laden's 9-11 Attack On American Soil.

The U.S. Government SHOULD Have Responded As Such Because What Happened To Our Nation On 9-11 Was Indeed An Act Of War!

However......

I Still Believe Bush's Administration Could Have Captured & Executed Osama Bin Laden Long Before The Obama Administration Acted If That Is TRULY What G.W. Bush Wanted.

History Has Since Proven Former Pres. George W. Bush Did NOT Really Want Bin Laden Killed.

How Do I Know This Theory To Be True?

Because It Took Bush's Administration 8 Years To NEVER Capture Osama Bin Laden, While It Took Obama's Administration ONLY 2 Years To Capture & Execute This Greedy Murderer.

So Please Don't Try To Persuade Me To Believe That Bush's Endorsement Of Torture Tactics Worked Or Helped Lead Obama's Administration Officials To Osama Bin Laden's Capture & Execution Because I'm NOT Buying It!!

Thanks To Pres. Obama's Afghan Troop Withdrawal Plan, A New Future Now Lies Ahead For America & Her U.S. Armed Forces.

No More Blood Money Being Wasted To Harbor Murderers & Crooks!!

No More U.S. Troops Being Used As Pawns On A Chessboard Losing Their Lives To Prop Up Greedy Politicians & Their Super Wealthy, No Tax Paying Government Contractor Friends!

Especially Government Contractor Friends Who Refuse To Hire Minority Veterans Or Pay Minority Veterans Wages Equal To What They Pay, White Veterans!

And Money Previously Wasted Overseas By The U.S. Dept Of Defense, Can Finally Be Put To Good Use Creating American Jobs Via Rebuilding Our OWN Nation.

Ex: Fixing Crumbling, Decades Old Infrastructures, Creating Clean Energy Jobs & Green Energy Jobs, Reducing Our Deficit, Restructuring Our Broken, Racist Public Education System, etc.,

So While I Do Agree Pres. Obama's Afghanistan Withdrawal Plan Should Have Been More Aggressive, I Still Applaud Him For Making The Best Of A Terrible Mess.

A "War On Terror" PROFITEERING Mess Left By His Predecessor, George W. Bush.

For The Record I Don't Hate Former Pres. George W. Bush.

I Just Hate What He Did To Our Country Via His Fake "War On Terror".

VOTE OBAMA IN 2012!!!






Obama Will Speed Pullout From War in Afghanistan


President Obama declared Wednesday that the United States had largely achieved its goals in Afghanistan, setting in motion a substantial withdrawal of American troops in an acknowledgment of the shifting threat in the region and the fast-changing political and economic landscape in a war-weary America.

Asserting that the country that served as a base for the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks no longer represented a terrorist threat to the United States, Mr. Obama declared that the “tide of war is receding.” And in a blunt recognition of domestic economic strains, he said, “America, it is time to focus on nation-building here at home.”

Mr. Obama announced plans to withdraw 10,000 troops from Afghanistan by the end of this year. The remaining 20,000 troops from the 2009 “surge” of forces would leave by next summer, amounting to about a third of the 100,000 troops now in the country. He said the drawdown would continue “at a steady pace” until the United States handed over security to the Afghan authorities in 2014.

The troop reductions, which were decided after a short but fierce internal debate, will be both deeper and faster than the recommendations made by Mr. Obama’s military commanders, and they will come as the president faces relentless budget pressures, an increasingly restive American public and a re-election campaign next year.

Only hours after Mr. Obama spoke, President Nicolas Sarkozy of France said on Thursday that he would also begin drawing down the 4,000-strong French contingent in Afghanistan.

”Given the progress we have seen, France will begin a gradual withdrawal of reinforcement troops sent to Afghanistan, in a proportional manner and in a calendar comparable to the withdrawal of American reinforcements,” Mr. Sarkozy said in a statement issued by his office, Reuters reported.

Mr. Obama, speaking in businesslike tones during a 15-minute address from the East Room of the White House, talked of ending America’s longest war and of the painful lessons he thought could be taken from it. While justifying the nation’s decade-long commitment, he talked of “ending the war responsibly” and warned of the perils of overextending the military by sending large numbers of soldiers into combat. He acknowledged that huge challenges remained before an end to the conflict that has cost hundreds of billions of dollars and 1,500 American lives.

The withdrawals would begin winding down the military’s counterinsurgency strategy, which Mr. Obama adopted 18 months ago. Administration officials indicated that they now planned to place more emphasis on focused clandestine counterterrorism operations of the kind that killed Osama bin Laden, which the president cited as Exhibit A in the case for a substantial American troop reduction.

“We are starting this drawdown from a position of strength,” Mr. Obama said. “Al Qaeda is under more pressure than at any time since 9/11.” He said that an intense campaign of drone strikes and other covert operations in Pakistan had crippled Al Qaeda’s original network in the region, leaving its leaders either dead or pinned down in the rugged border between Pakistan and Afghanistan. Of 30 top Qaeda leaders identified by American intelligence, 20 have been killed in the last year and a half, administration officials said.

But the withdrawal of the entire surge force by the end of next summer will significantly change the way that the United States wages war in Afghanistan, analysts said, suggesting that the administration may have concluded it can no longer achieve its loftiest ambitions there.

Mr. Obama acknowledged as much in his remarks. “We will not try to make Afghanistan a perfect place,” he said. “We will not police its streets or patrol its mountains indefinitely. That is the responsibility of the Afghan government.”

Mr. Obama’s decision is a victory for Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., who has long argued for curtailing the military operation in Afghanistan. Mr. Obama indicated a willingness to move toward more focused covert operations of the type that the United States is conducting in Pakistan, Yemen and elsewhere. “When threatened, we must respond with force,” he said. “But when that force can be targeted, we need not deploy large armies overseas.”

The pace of the withdrawal is a setback for the president’s top commander in Afghanistan, Gen. David H. Petraeus, who has been named director of the Central Intelligence Agency. General Petraeus did not endorse the decision, said another official. Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates argued publicly against a too-hasty withdrawal of troops, but he said in a statement on Wednesday that he supported Mr. Obama’s decision.

During the internal debate, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton also expressed reservations about the scale of the reductions, officials said.

General Petraeus had recommended limiting withdrawals to 5,000 troops this year and another 5,000 over the winter.

He and other military commanders argued that the 18 months since Mr. Obama announced the troop increase did not allow for enough time for the Americans to consolidate the fragile gains that they had made in Helmand and other provinces.

But troops have succeeded in clearing many towns and cities of insurgents, and then keeping them safe so that markets were able to reopen and girls could go to school, for example.

Military officials say the withdrawal of American troops will impose limits on which areas of the country can be pacified. In particular, plans to pivot extra American troops from south and southwestern Afghanistan to volatile areas in the east, along the Pakistan border, will be curtailed or even canceled, officials said.

The effort to transfer responsibility for security to Afghan forces remains elusive because the Afghan troops are proving unprepared for the job. Corruption in the government of President Hamid Karzai continues to be rampant, sapping the confidence of many Afghans.

Still, the growing disenchantment in the United States with the war, particularly given the ballooning national debt, the country’s slow economic recovery and the whopping $120 billion price tag of the Afghan conflict this year alone, were all considerations weighed by the president. “Over the last decade, we have spent a trillion dollars on war at a time of rising debt and hard economic times,” Mr. Obama said. “Now, we must invest in America’s greatest resource: our people.”

Republican presidential candidates including Mitt Romney and Jon M. Huntsman Jr. are demanding a swift withdrawal from Afghanistan, while Democrats complain that the cost of the war is siphoning money away from efforts to create jobs in the United States. Representative Dana Rohrabacher, Republican of California, called on Mr. Obama to speed the withdrawal. “If we’re going to leave, we should leave,” he said in a statement. “The centralized system of government foisted upon the Afghan people is not going to hold after we leave. So let’s quit prolonging the agony and the inevitable.”

Highlighting the unusual political splits the war is causing, other Republicans criticized the president for pulling out too soon. Representative Mike Rogers, the Michigan Republican who is chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, suggested that Mr. Obama was playing politics with the troop reduction, saying, “The president is trying to find a political solution with a military component, when it needs to be the other way around.” He said the situation in Afghanistan was “very precarious,” and that the White House seemed to be panicking about the levels of violence.

Mr. Obama’s speech, delivered at dawn on Thursday, Kabul time, is expected to be the subject of a speech by Afghanistan’s president, Hamid Karzai, scheduled for later in the day. Senior figures in Mr. Karzai’s administration began signaling that they were comfortable with the withdrawal of 10,000 troops by year’s end.

Gen. Mohammad Zahir Azimi, a spokesman for the Defense Ministry, said the Afghan National Army “has this capability and quantity to fill the gap of those places where the foreign troops withdraw and leave Afghanistan.”

“We are ready,” General Azimi said.

Muhammad Siddique Aziz, an adviser to Mr. Karzai on tribal affairs, said the withdrawal plan was acceptable, but he warned against a complete withdrawal of American troops before the Afghan government was strong enough to administer the country on its own. “I think they have to concentrate more on the Afghan government so when they leave, the government can stand up on its own,” Mr. Aziz said.


View Larger Map

Sources: CNN, Guardian.co.uk, MSNBC, NY Times, Raw Story, Youtube, Google Maps

Obama Closes Door On Bush's Costly "War On Terror" (Thank You!)

Tonight Pres. Barack Obama Will Finally Announce The End To Former President G.W. Bush's Very Expensive, Oil/ Government Contractor Scheme: His Fake "War On Terror".

Immediately After Sept. 11, 2011, No One Doubted Bush's Intent To Invade Iraq Because Practically Everyone In America Thought It Only Right To Get The "Bad Guys" (Al Qaeda) For Breaching Our Safety Net & Destroying Our Comfort.

We Sincerely Wanted To Show Terrorists & Extremists That NO ONE Can Attack America, On American Soil & Get Away With It!

NO ONE!

Thus When G.W. Bush Approached Congress With His LIE-Based ("Weapons Of Mass Destruction") Scheme To Invade Iraq, For Lawmakers On The Hill To Question His True Motives Would Have Appeared Anti-Patriotic.

Fast Forward To 8 Years Later.

There Were NO "Weapons Of Mass Destruction"!

It Was Later Discovered We Were ONLY There To Protect The Interests Of GOP-Registered, Oil Rich American "Powers That Be".

And Even After Capturing Saddam Hussein, U.S. Troops Are STILL In Iraq, Afghanistan & Pakistan.

Why?

Since Both Saddam & Bin Laden Are Now Dead, Why Are We STILL In Those Countries??

Why Are U.S. Military Generals STILL Insisting We Remain In Iraq, Afghanistan & Pakistan?

Could It The ONLY Foreign Policy Interests Our U.S. Troops Are Currently Protecting Are Those Of GOP Lawmakers Profiting In A HUGE Way Via Government Contractors?

i.e., Blackwater Now XE, Balfour Beatty, Dyn Corp, KBR, Halliburton, etc.,

YES!!!

This Is The ONLY Reason Why GOP Lawmakers On Capitol Hill & Pentagon Brass Are STILL Insisting U.S. Troops Remain In Iraq, Afghanistan & Pakistan.

Truth Be Told GOP Lawmakers Don't Give A Darn About The Lives Of Thousands Of U.S. Troops Lost In Iraq, Afghanistan & Pakistan!

They Just Want To Keep Their Pockets Fat At Any Cost!!

i.e., BLOOD MONEY!!

And To Make Matters Worst, Most Government Contractors (Blackwater Now XE, Balfour Beatty, Dyn Corp, KBR, Halliburton) Working In Iraq, Afghanistan & Pakistan Largely Practice Racial Discrimination By Hiring Very, Very Few Minority Veterans. (Almost Zero Black Veterans!)

Or If They Do Hire Any Minority Veterans, Those Minority Veterans Are Paid Much Lower Salaries Than White Veterans.

In Addition, Balfour Beatty A Construction Company Which Helps To Build & Manage U.S. Military Bases, Also Grossly OVERCHARGES Active Duty Soldiers & Veterans Residing On Those U.S. Military Bases.

So I Along With Millions Of Other American Voters (Democrats, Independents & Republicans) All Agree Its High Time This Government Contractor/ Oil-Rich Charade FINALLY Comes To An End!!

Like Yesterday!

For The Record, American Voters Are NOT Stupid!!!

We Know That George W. Bush Left Behind A Mess, In Fact Several Messes For Pres. Obama To Clean Up!

i.e., Deregulated Wall Street Mess, Subprime Housing Mess, Iraq Mess, Afghanistan Mess, Pakistan Mess, Osama Bin Laden Mess, TARP Mess, HUGE Unemployment Mess, etc.,

YES!

While Serving 8 Years In Office, George W. Bush Left Behind A Ton Of Serious Messes & Now The GOP Unrealistically Expects Barack Obama To Clean Up Those Serious Messes After Serving Just 2 Years In Office!

Well Its Time For Bush's Messes To Be Placed In The Trash Can Where They Belong!

In 2008 Barack Obama Was Elected NOT To Continue George W. Bush's Political/ Deregulated Charades For Personal Gain.

Instead Obama Was Elected To Discontinue & Clean Up G.W. Bush's Messes So That America Could Begin To Heal.

Obama Was Elected To Discontinue Bush's Schemes & Bring Our Troops Home!

As It Relates To George W. Bush's Government Contractor, "Nation Building" Scheme, Let The Corrupt Leaders Of Afghanistan & Pakistan Build Their OWN Nations, With Their OWN Money!

Do We Need To Maintain Some Type Of Alliance With Pakistan Even Though Its Been Proven They Can't Be Trusted?

Yes Or They Will Build An Alliance With India & China Against America.

However.....

American Leaders Should NO Longer Allow Afghanistan & Pakistani Leaders To Make Fools Of Us Or Hold American Leaders Hostage!!!

Tonight During Pres. Obama's Anti-War/ Afghanistan U.S. Troop Withdrawal Speech American Voters Expect To NOT Only Hear That Our Soldiers Are Coming Home For Good!

But Also That America Will NEVER Again Use U.S. Military Troops For Personal Gain i.e., Oil & Government Contractors!

NEVER Again!!!

NO MORE BLOOD MONEY!!

Pres. Obama Should Also Apologize To All The Families Of U.S. Troops Serving Overseas, Including Those Who Lost Loved Ones During Combat And.....

YES Pres. Obama Should Apologize To Iraq, Afghanistan & Pakistan For What Past U.S. Leaders Did For The Sake Of Personal Gain.

Don't Get It Twisted!

Should We Have Caught & Killed Osama Bin Laden For What He Did To Our Country On 9-11??

YES! A Thousand Times Yes!

However Doing So Did NOT Take 8 Years!

I Repeat: It Did NOT Take 8 Years To Capture & Kill Osama Bin Laden!!

I Truly Believe Former President George W. Bush Knew Exactly Where Osama Was Hiding.

I Also Believe G.W. Bush & His Administration Was Somehow Involved In A Scheme To Pay Off Pakistani Leaders To Help Hide Bin Laden.

Why??

Oil & Government Contractors!!

Pres. George W. Bush Will One Day Pay For His LIES, Deceit & Sin But....

Tonight America Expects Pres. Barack Obama To End Bush's LIES & Start A New Chapter In American Foreign Policy Sans LIES!!!

Pres. Obama Please Don't Disappoint Us Tonight.

God Bless America Land That I Love & ALL U.S. Troops Everywhere!









Cost of Wars a Rising Issue as Obama Weighs Troop Levels


President Obama will talk about troop numbers in Afghanistan when he makes a prime-time speech from the White House on Wednesday night. But behind his words will be an acute awareness of what $1.3 trillion in spending on two wars in the past decade has meant at home: a ballooning budget deficit and a soaring national debt at a time when the economy is still struggling to get back on its feet.

As Mr. Obama begins trying to untangle the country from its military and civilian promises in Afghanistan, his critics and allies alike are drawing a direct line between what is not being spent to bolster the sagging economy in America to what is being spent in Afghanistan — $120 billion this year alone.

On Monday, the United States Conference of Mayors made that connection explicitly, saying that American taxes should be paying for bridges in Baltimore and Kansas City, not in Baghdad and Kandahar.

The mayors’ group approved a resolution calling for an early end to the American military role in Afghanistan and Iraq, asking Congress to redirect the billions now being spent on war and reconstruction costs toward urgent domestic needs. The resolution, which noted that local governments cut 28,000 jobs in May alone, was the group’s first venture into foreign policy since it passed a resolution four decades ago calling for an end to the Vietnam War.

And in a speech on the Senate floor on Tuesday, Senator Joe Manchin III, Democrat of West Virginia, said: “We can no longer, in good conscience, cut services and programs at home, raise taxes or — and this is very important — lift the debt ceiling in order to fund nation-building in Afghanistan. The question the president faces — we all face — is quite simple: Will we choose to rebuild America or Afghanistan? In light of our nation’s fiscal peril, we cannot do both.”



Demonstrators describing themselves as “angry jobless citizens” said they would picket the Capitol on Wednesday to urge members of Congress to use any savings from Mr. Obama’s troop reductions to create more jobs. The group sponsoring the demonstration, the Prayer Without Ceasing Party, said in a statement on Tuesday that it was “urging the masses to call their congressmen and the president to ensure that jobs receive a top priority when the troops start returning to America.”

Spending on the war in Afghanistan has skyrocketed since Mr. Obama took office, to $118.6 billion in 2011. It was $14.7 billion in 2003, when President George W. Bush turned his attention and American resources to the war in Iraq.

The increase is easy to explain. When Mr. Obama took office, he vowed to aggressively pursue what he termed America’s “war of necessity” (Afghanistan) and to withdraw from America’s “war of choice” (Iraq). He has done so; the lines on Iraq and Afghanistan war spending crossed in 2010, when the United States spent $93.8 billion in Afghanistan versus $71.3 billion in Iraq, according to the Congressional Research Service.

But the White House is keenly aware that the president is heading into a re-election campaign; with the country’s jobless rate remaining high, topping 9 percent, his poll numbers on his handling of the domestic economy have plummeted.

“Do we really need to be spending $120 billion in a country with a G.D.P. that’s one-sixth that size?” asked Brian Katulis, a national security expert at the Center for American Progress, a policy group with close ties to the Obama administration. “Most Americans would be shocked to know that we’re spending that kind of money for jobs programs for former Taliban, and would wonder where are our jobs programs for Detroit and Cleveland?”

In 2010, Congress — at the Obama administration’s request — set aside $100 million to support programs in Afghanistan aimed at moving former insurgents off the battlefields and into the country’s mainstream economy. Those efforts — similar to what the Bush administration did in Iraq — have yet to bear much fruit; the 1,700 fighters who have enrolled in the reintegration program represent only a fraction of the estimated 20,000 to 40,000 Taliban insurgents, The New York Times reported Monday.

Most American aid bypasses the Afghan government and goes to international companies, a practice that, according to a June 8 report by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, can undercut the Afghan government and lead to redundant and unsustainable donor projects. But Obama administration officials complain that the Afghan government of President Hamid Karzai has, thus far, been unwilling to tackle corruption in any meaningful way, making it hard to argue that it should get more money directly.

In Washington, the argument over whether the United States should be building bridges in Kandahar or Cleveland is bound to grow even louder as the 2012 election campaign heats up.

After Senator Manchin made his speech on Tuesday calling for an end to nation-building in Afghanistan, Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona, took to the floor to rebuke him, calling Mr. Manchin’s remarks characteristic of the “isolationist-withdrawal-lack-of-knowledge-of-history attitude that seems to be on the rise.”

But in Mr. McCain’s own Republican Party, which has historically been more supportive of both the Iraq and Afghanistan wars than Democrats, there is clearly some queasiness about war spending during a period of economic distress.

Four years ago, Representative Ron Paul of Texas was the only Republican presidential candidate raising concerns about the costs of the Afghanistan or Iraq wars. But last week, Mr. Paul was joined explicitly by another contender, Jon M. Huntsman Jr., the former governor of Utah and the Obama administration’s former ambassador to China, who said that the cost of a continued military presence was a leading factor in his belief that a major troop drawdown should begin in Afghanistan.

“Very expensive boots on the ground may be something that is not critical for our national security needs,” Mr. Huntsman said.

Even when Mr. Obama does withdraw the bulk of troops from Afghanistan, Americans will still be footing the bill for years, argued William R. Keylor, an international relations professor at Boston University.

“The total cost of the war, the longest in American history and one that was paid for by borrowing rather than by increased taxation, should not be measured solely by the costs of financing the troops and the extensive aid programs administered by the State Department,” Mr. Keylor said. “It should also include long-term costs of the war, primarily veterans’ benefits for the returning soldiers, who will require medical and mental health services for many years to come. Long after the last troops depart from the country, that hidden part of the bill will come due.”


View Larger Map


Sources: CNN, NY Times, Washington Post, Wikipedia, Youtube, Google Maps