Winning and losing

In any competitive enterprise, as far as I know, there are always winners and losers. This basic truth seems not to apply to U.S. "war" efforts. Apparently our military adventures are such that we cannot lose. If we appear to be losing we just continue the enterprise endlessy, I guess into eternity. Because we cannot lose. Thus it is that I heard the only Iraq veteran serving in Congress, when speaking about Afghanistan, say "we have to win." We don't seem to be winning there. But we keep on fighting because, apparently, "we have to win." It is as if none of these people have ever experienced (or even conceived) of losing. Has every football, basketball, baseball or other team ever not lost? Weren't we always told we should learn to be "good losers?" Weren't we all taught that "you can't win them all?" Would someone be kind enought to tell me what it is we might actually "win" in Afghanistan? If no one has ever been able to subdue Afghanistan, including the Russians with 100,000 troops, what makes us believe we can win anything. What is there to win, assuming it is even possible to win? Indeed, explain to me why we are even still there (they don't seem to have a lot of oil). Oh, right, I know, we are bringing them democracy (at the barrels of our guns). We are going to make it possible for Afghani women to wear bikinis instead of burkas. Actually, we are the goddamndest fools ever created by intelligent design.

Harry Reid, the leader of our Senate, has now decided to put off any further discussion of Iraq for a couple of weeks. Like, there is nothing going on there that requires any urgent discussion or solution or anything. Perhaps there will be a moratorium on violence while the Democrats decide what, if anything, they might decide to do. The U.S. Senate, the greatest non-deliberative body in the world. They can't even decide whether to talk about deciding. What the hell, a few more soldiers and probably hundreds more innocent Iraqis will die while our Senators suck their thumbs, but we wouldn't want to act precipitously. And we certainly wouldn't want to take any meaningful action - like impeaching the two greatest war criminals on earth, the only practical way to stop their insanity before it destroys us all. The only Congressperson that has a real plan for bringing our troops home quickly, and makes sense out of madness, Dennis Kucinich, is treated with contempt by the MSM. He is trying to sell a product no one seems to want - PEACE! We simply cannot tamper with our military/industrial/political/fascist complex. We can't afford to mess around with a functioning whole designed to insure that the rich get richer and poor get poorer. It's the American way.

Many years back a starlet had a huge St. Bernard that she named Flopalong Placidly. For some reason I cannot understand this has stayed with me all these years. When I let it, it becomes like a sickness. I tend to run these kinds of description over and over again. You know, things like Creepalong Crabbily, Runalong Rapidly, Crashalong Crabbily, Flapalong Floridly, Lopalong Lucidly, Bouncealong Bountiously, Sprintalong Splendidly, Inchalong Insipidly, Crawlalong Cautiously, and on and on. The possibilities are endless. I wish I had never heard of Flopalong Placidly. But then, I wish I had never heard of Bush/Cheney, neocons, or Republicans.