Andrew Cockburn at TomDispatch.com writes—The Pentagon’s Real Strategy (Victory is assured on the military’s main battlefield—Washington):
These days, lamenting the apparently aimless character of Washington’s military operations in the Greater Middle East has become conventional wisdom among administration critics of every sort. Senator John McCain thunders that “this president has no strategy to successfully reverse the tide of slaughter and mayhem” in that region. Anthony Cordesman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies bemoans the “lack of a viable and public strategy.” Andrew Bacevich suggests that “there is no strategy. None. Zilch.”
After 15 years of grinding war with no obvious end in sight, US military operations certainly deserve such obloquy. But the pundit outrage may be misplaced. Focusing on Washington rather than on distant war zones, it becomes clear that the military establishment does indeed have a strategy, a highly successful one, which is to protect and enhance its own prosperity.
Given this focus, creating and maintaining an effective fighting force becomes a secondary consideration, reflecting a relative disinterest—remarkable to outsiders—in the actual business of war, as opposed to the business of raking in dollars for the Pentagon and its industrial and political partners. A key element of the strategy involves seeding the military budget with “development” projects that require little initial outlay but which, down the line, grow irreversibly into massive, immensely profitable production contracts for our weapons-making cartels.
If this seems like a startling proposition, consider, for instance, the Air Force’s determined and unyielding efforts to jettison the A-10 Thunderbolt, widely viewed as the most effective means for supporting troops on the ground, while ardently championing the sluggish, vastly overpriced F-35 Joint Strike Fighter that, among myriad other deficiencies, cannot fly within 25 miles of a thunderstorm. No less telling is the Navy’s ongoing affection for budget-busting programs such as aircraft carriers, while maintaining its traditional disdain for the unglamorous and money-poor mission of minesweeping, though the mere threat of enemy mines in the 1991 Gulf War (as in the Korean War decades earlier) stymied plans for major amphibious operations. Examples abound across all the services. [...]
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At Daily Kos on this date in 2004—Labor and the veep:
Conventional wisdom is that labor is pushing for a Gephardt veep nomination, and the CW is generally right. There's no doubt that Gephardt is the choice of most of the building trades and, especially, Hoffa's Teamsters. While many of us may groan at the idea of Gephardt as Kerry's sidekick, his nomination would put a charge in the efforts of many unions and their members.
But aside from that, Edwards is getting grudging acceptance amongst the old union set. Even Hoffa, who flirted with Bush the past two years, has said he would accept Edwards. His economic message (two Americas) resonates well with union audiences and has helped raise Edwards' veep stock even higher.
It's funny, everything I hear is that Edwards is increasingly the top choice of many party insiders, but that Kerry doesn't like Edwards and would have to be dragged into chosing him. It's the root of just about every rumor I hear -- "everyone wants Edwards, but Kerry is not convinced and doesn't much like him. Hence, he's taking a look at ---."
What's funny is that I don't think I've ever read anything indicating that Kerry, indeed, doesn't get along with Edwards.
On today's "encore performance" Kagro in the Morning show, Greg Dworkin rounded up 2016 news & Pope-luar Science. TX goes gold buggy. Joan McCarter warns us the Gop plans to derail net neutrality. More trade fights, King v. Burwell watch, and the Gowdy vs. Issa Benghazi spat.
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