The American Soldiers' Dilemma in Iraq

(For a larger image of the cartoon below, go to Vagabond Scholar and click on cartoon to enlarge.)



Here is the transcript:

A. This is an al-Qaeda terrorist in Iraq He hates Shi'ites. He hates Americans. He is our enemy.

B. This is a Sunni insurgent in Iraq. He hates Shi'ites. He hates Americans. He is our enemy, too.

C. This is an Iraqi who supports the Shi'ite-led Iraqi government. He hates Americans. He is our friend.

D. This is a Shi'ite militian man. He hates Sunnis. He supports the Iraqi government who are our friends. He is our enemy.

E. This is an Iraqi Kurd who hates the Turks who are our friends. He is our friend.

F. This is a Turk who hates the Kurds who are our friends. He is our friend, too.

G. This is an Iranian who supports the Shi'ite-led Iraqi government who are our friends. He is our enemy.

H. This is a Syrian Sunni foreign-fighter in Iraq. He hates the Iranians who are our enemies and the Iraqi government who are our friends. He is our enemy.

I. This is a Sunni from a moderate Arab country. He hates Iran. He hates America. He is our friend.

J. This is a Shi'ite who works for the Iraqi government who are our friends. He supports the Iranians who are our enemies. He hates Americans. He is our friend.

Question: Who do you shoot? Turn over for answer:

Answer:
Definitely shoot A, H and B.
Sometimes shoot C and D.
Don’t shoot E, J, F and I.
Try not to shoot G, but if you do, we won’t worry too much about it.

Cartoon by Darryl Cagle, from a post on Vagabond Scholar.

What can I add to this, except: What a catastrophuck!

It's (almost) Presidents' Day!

I took a quiz (and aren't they silly!) to find out what US president would suit me--if I was into being courted by a president, that is. (Jackie Kennedy v Marilyn Monroe, Hillary Clinton v Monica Lewinski--there's courted, and then there's "courted, right?)

So which one did I end up with? James Madison!

James Madison (March 16, 1751 – June 28, 1836), an American politician and fourth President of the United States of America (1809–1817), was one of the most influential Founding Fathers of the United States.

More than anyone he designed the new Constitution of 1787, and is known as the "Father of the Constitution". In 1788, he wrote over a third of the Federalist Papers, still the most influential commentary on the Constitution. As a leader in the first Congresses he drafted many basic laws and was responsible for the first ten amendments to the Constitution, and thus he is also known as the "Father of the Bill of Rights".

As a political theorist Madison's most distinctive belief was that the new republic needed checks and balances to limit the powers of special interests, which Madison called factions. He believed very strongly that the new nation should fight against aristocracy and corruption (especially of British origin), and was deeply committed to creating mechanisms that would make Republicanism in the United States work in practice.

And he was married to one of the foremost feminists of Colonial America: Dolley Todd Madison!

Hah! Take that, Jackie, Marilyn, Hillary and Monica!

The Anti-bible takes on the "global worming"

Picture this: We're a small band of rational minds on a mission, in the Xian Wilderness, to re-establish a True Enlightenment. Attacked on all sides by subhuman theist-zombies, and running low on ammunition (Dawkins/Harris/Dennett/Pollit need to publish more often!), we've circled the wagons against the DimWarriors of XianDarkness. It looks bad for our brave band...

Suddenly, a shout! "Look! On the ridge!"

Can it be? YES! It's the 10th Cavalry of Reason, bringing us copies of "The Quotable Atheist"!

A little over-the-top. Sorry...

Ammunition for Atheists

The following is an excerpt from Jack Huberman's new book, The Quotable Atheist: Ammunition for Nonbelievers, Political Junkies, Gadflies, and Those Generally Hell-Bound (Nation Books, 2007).

The world (not just America) is deeply divided.The main fault line is where the tectonic plates of religion and of reason/secularism/ modernity/science/Enlightenment meet and grind against each other, making an absolutely unbearable noise. It's sort of like ... forget it, I can't describe it.

[Quoting End of Faith, by Sam Harris]"...Only 28 percent of Americans believe in evolution; 68 percent believe in Satan. Ignorance in this degree, concentrated in both the head and belly of a lumbering superpower, is now a problem for the entire world."

We need to change the cultural climate so as to make supernatural, occult, and faith-based claptrap feel unwelcome and to make adults ashamed of the blithe surrender of their otherwise sound minds to idiocy.We need climate change. Bullshit levels are rising globally, threatening to submerge intellectually low-lying areas. Much of the United States is already inundated.Temperatures are rising; IQs are dropping. Four of the five stupidest years on record have occurred since 2000.

I would of course have preferred a declaration by the president of the United States -- purportedly God's messenger on earth...Failing that, it is up to atheist/secularist groups and individuals to do what we can to stop global worming (people groveling like worms before nonexistent deities). That's where this book comes in.

You can read the rest of the post and samples (link above) from Richard Dawkins, Phyllis Diller, Phil Donahue, Frederick Douglass, Jerry Falwell, Thomas Jefferson, Michael Moore, and Katha Pollit. (Jerry Falwell? WTF?)

By: Naomi

America's Day of Shame!

If you read Martian.Anthropologist, you'll remember VastLeft, of VastLeftWingConspiracy blog, and a regular contributor on MA. As a favor, he asked that I post on as many blogs as I can that today is the anniversary of a shameful day: Colin Powell, the Secretary of State, a respected military man and former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, addressed the United Nations on Saddam Hussein's non-existent "weapons of mass destruction". If not exactly treason, it has damaged his reputation irreparably. (I lifted the photo from the Day of Shame website; I can't do "teh photoshop"--otherwise, it would be "stamped" with the word "Whore!")

Do you remember watching his speech to the UN? Did it make your afraid? In the photo, he's holding that "tell-tale" vial of (supposedly) anthrax. How well did he convince you that it really held Death?

On February 5, 2003, Secretary of State Colin Powell addressed the United Nations to rally support for an invasion of Iraq.

Outside of war co-planner the United Kingdom, few international troops would join the U.S. in the invasion and occupation.

Yet Powell's speech had a galvanizing effect on America's mainstream media. As one, they declared the presentation "compelling."

For a nation living in the ghostly shadow of the twin towers, the MSM's Good Warmaking seal of approval was enough to keep that treasonous question — "why?" — relatively unheard.

In this space, we'll consider what was lost that day, as we mark a sobering holiday: America's Day of Shame.

Please visit VastLeft's log page and share your thoughts about this tragic occasion — your recollections of the run-up to the Iraq war and your ideas on how we can fix a news establishment that traded its reporter's fedora for a cheerleader's uniform.