That last point is a good one. I’m ashamed to admit that this possibility never so much as crossed my mind before. It’s quite likely a factor.

Eenteresting.

Well then have them run around and throw rocks at each other. Do we still need to spend the money on more fighter jets, aircraft carriers, etc. Maybe they can help inspect cargo or build levees.

By golly, this presidenting is harder than I thought.

btw Candy you stole my stripper name. (Or my nom de pole) I guess I could be “OtherCandy” but that’s just stupid.

because he doesn’t want to dump a quarter of a million Americans on an economy that won’t hire them.

The old “Obama’s playing 11 dimensional chess and we are only playing with 9 dimensions” ploy.

Sadly, No !!!

How hard is it to “redeploy” these government employees into … umm … a “Civilian Conservation Corps” ?

Oh. That would not involve killing and maiming random innocent people.

And it might perform a social good.

I withdraw the question.

To answer: strategic considerations, wanting to defeat the Taliban and secure Afghanistan, and strategic considerations.

Supposed he did pull the plug on all these things (like any president would have the power and/or political capital to do so). Wouldn’t all the active duty personnel stay on active duty? I’m not sure how many reservists and guard we have over there, but it isn’t all of them.

Also, if there is no timely economic recovery and there are no jobs available in a year or two when the troops would be coming home from Iraq, then he (and the country) are screwed anyway.

Boing!

wah-wah-wahhhhh

DW – I think the 11-dimensional chess stuff is more about Obama’s weakness for choosing ‘orderly wind-downs’ as the answer to all problems – e.g. the financial sector’s toxicity and the assumption that creative destruction applied to ‘too big to fail’ institutions will necessarily lead to a global depression or even the immediate collapse of the whole ball of wax.

I don’t think considerations the administration might be having about what the hell to do with a ton of recalled soldiers in this bleak economy can be classified as 11-dimensional chess, or more accurately, that my raising of the possibility that the above is being worried over qualifies as me pulling the 11D chess card here.

I think, if anything, that if Obama can’t figure out how to draw down troops as he promised and at the same time not spike unemployment by a couple percentage points, that it shows his lack of super strategerizing power.

It’s a perfectly logic hypothesis. And explains the reason that no president dare speak its name.

The problem arose before, after WWII. Women had become a significant percentage of the workforce, and they all had to be fired to make room for returning soldiers. (This led, in due time, to second-wave feminism.) That’s hardly a viable option today.

But it is maddening that they can’t be doing something other than defending territories that don’t need defending anymore.

Imagine if all the military budgets of the world were directed toward infrastructure and research.

So why is his administration arguing for Don’t Ask Don’t Tell in court when even a majority of conservatives support gays serving openly in the military? Huh? Explain that!

Hey cunt rags, shut your cockholes, that’s why.

Get onboard, fuckstains. We’ve got voters to appease and seats to pick up.

Possibly because he represents the status quo and all the hope and change talk meant about as much as it would have pre-Bush times.

No way Lesley. Obama is playing 117 dimension chess while his opponents are playing checkers. You just wait and see. The fact that he is playing chess with the lives of American soldiers just makes it all the more thrilling!

Hope. Change. A new day in America.

Obviously, the money spent on our imperial escapades could easily finance the creation of 250,000 jobs but it ain’t going to happen. Obama is just the latest genial emcee for the corporate carnival. It’s his job to bring in the suckers; not turn them away by telling them they’re just about to get fleeced. So far he’s doing very well. At least until the economy really collapses.

Hey asswipes, if I have to come in there again I’m crackin’ skulls. Mess with the bull and you get the horns.

Of the 3 possibilities, I have to lead with strategic considerations re: Afghanistan. That’s a lot of long-neglected problems there.

That, and also the possibility of coming to Pakistan’s aid if need be, from across the Afghanistan border…

What will have to be done with those soldiers when they can come home, however, is another interesting point.

Maybe it’s the classic Heinlein I’ve been reading tonight, but I hope those soldiers don’t come home to a fragmenting society, and set it right by going all proto-fascist as the lead-in to a Starship Troopers future.

As if the only thing separating Obama from a complete withdrawal from Iraq, Afghanistan and other foreign military bases is an economic recovery…

How do you run an empire without personnel?

Occam’s Razor says inertia.

The blood of all those who have & will die in Iraq covers the hands of George Bush & his flunkies/handlers/manipulators.

I doubt if many service personnel will be dumped on the job market even when the draw-down is complete. The volunteer army enlists for specific lengths. It’s not like WWII where they drafted soldiers for the duration, & de-mobilized them as soon as possible after hostilities were over.

And I’d imagine that virtually everyone who can will re-up rather than enter the civilian slave market.

In the long run (other than the inevitability of death) there is going to be a U. S. military presence in Southwest & South Asia until every drop of oil & molecule of gas is wrenched from the ground (& until Israel is run into the Mediterranean or goes for the two-state solution). There’s nothing any President can do to change that.

John Caruso has an alternative explanation.

The ol’ “We’re paying them over there so we don’t have to pay them over here” theory, eh?

Meh.

Keep everyone suited up and rebuild our failing infrastructure. Pull them out of Iraq and finish things in Afghanistan, with less bombs and more boots on the ground.

There are lots of alternatives, I would think keeping things the same in Iraq as an employment measure is pretty far fetched. It’s likely a combination of factors, trying to do it but slowly, getting into office and realizing what a total mess things still were in Iraq once he got the briefings– and so on. And then being far less progressive and commited to the anti-war thing than people thought, yeah there’s that.

I’m really not sure what to make of it, seeing as how apparently we’ve reached the point where fully half of our forces in Iraq and Afghanistan are mercenaries private contractors. That’s something like 250k of the motherfuckers. Admittedly, that’s not even half of an average month’s job evaporation number these days, but still. Of course, these mercenaries private contractors don’t have even the basic support structure of the VA when they get back, so who knows how fucked up they’ll be. Yup, sure will be nice to have those folks back home.

Say goodnight, Captain Sunshine.

Goodnight Captain Sunshine.

I’ve never thought Obama was some sort of Godsend. He was, and is, enormously better than the other alternative. A step in the right direction. Not even necessarily a big step, but I’ll take what I can get. The whingetards are going to make doing anything even vaguely right extremely difficult. We knows their definition of bipartisanship by now, and it involves eating their big bowl of dicks. Otherwise, you get it with both barrels. The President and our spineless Congress are playing the Republican’s game still. Oh, well. At least I don’t get agita every time I glimpse the news or think about anything or everything the government might be doing. Only every other time. Baby steps. Like I said, I’ll take what I can get.

Bringing the troops home doesn’t mean discharging them into civilian life.

Hypothesis fail.

I would think military would be employed anyway – it’s some of the national guard or anyone who was leaving and stop-lossed who might be affected. Even then, they might prefer to be stateside. Some more research is needed, methinks. However, much of the money we’re pissing away on defense overseas is really needed domestically, so there’s that, too. Unemployed troopers is a drop in the bucket compared to the usual Pentagon waste and two wars.

“But also possibly – and nobody ever seems to mention this – because he doesn’t want to dump a quarter of a million Americans on an economy that won’t hire them.”

That’s as dumb a statement as I’ve ever read on this site. He could pay them the same coin they are making now to sit on their asses in military bases, and it would _save_ a shitload of money. The fact that the US economy is bad is a reason to bring the soldiers home, not leave them in the Middle East.

I hope you (D. Aristophanes) write a follow-up where you acknowledge how fucking stupid a theory that is. That’s as dumb as Powerline imagining that George Bush has his complicated reasons that the rest of us just can’t comprehend.

Also, the last time there were closings of old and unnecessary bases and decommissioning of a few weapons systems (after the collapse of the Soviet Union) by George H. W. Bush Sr, right wingers used it as an opportunity to blame Bill Clinton for those cuts and claim that Clinton ‘hollowed’ out the military and ruined America and blah-di-blah-di-blah, and this was allowed to become ‘realitized’ by the major news media.

I don’t think the unemployment theory is a good one either but a mea culpa post is not enough for me. I demand that D.A. start a new blog dedicated to apologizing for it with mocking photoshops of himself and a new derogatory nickname posted every day. Maybe throw up a few of those funny piss taking videos too. firemealreadygoddammit.com

Maybe he’s doing it because he thinks Americans are prettier than other nations and sending troops all over the world is thus a global beautification scheme. There’s about as much evidence for this hypothesis as the one proposed here.

I don’t see any reason not to take Obama at his word about this stuff. He thinks it’s in America’s strategic interest to do these things. Now, I wish him nothing but failure in his attempts to secure America’s strategic interests, but I don’t think there are any secrets as to why he’s doing what he’s doing.

No, the “promises” from the beginnings of his campaign were always hollow. There were always promises of expansion of the military, expansion of the war in Afghanistan, and a pretty lame promise for the drawdown in Iraq (consult with experts, blah blah blah). He is as much a tool of American Empire as any president in the last 6 decades. He wouldn’t have gotten such deep backing from the business elites if that was not the case.

Plus there is all that oil…

That’s as dumb a statement as I’ve ever read on this site.

Small victories … but really, I’m sure I’ve written dumber ones.

I’m not surprised at all by Obama’s volte-face on everything from “preventive detention” to DADT.

What is surprising is how quickly we are starting to notice this time. People were still expecting Clinton to “come around” once he’d won re-election.

a quarter of a million Americans

Drop in the bucket. Also if he’s interested in just employing people there are other schemes.

DA, there is clearly an element of that, altho many if not most of that number are enlisted regular army, so would simply be deployed elsewhere or based back at home.

The Guardsmen, however, which I would estimate number nearly 100,000, those puppies would eventually hit the economic numbers in some fashion. Many of them have work guarantees in that employers may not hinder them in career advancement as a quid pro quo for doing their country’s service, including the right to their job when they return.

It’s unclear how long that commitment must be maintained, particularly if a position is cut along with others in a mass layoff, but it’s there.

RB – well, he should be rolling out those other schemes. The stimulus should have been three times the size it was.

You’ve got to distinguish between Iraq and Afghanistan here.

As a candidate, he promised to escalate the war on Afghanistan. It’s a bad policy, but he’s always been entirely up front about his plans to pursue it (there really wasn’t a dime’s worth of difference between him and McCain on Afghanistan).

Iraq is a different case. He promised a particular timetable. If that timetable is extended…well, that’s further grounds for anger.

I think, if anything, that if Obama can’t figure out how to draw down troops as he promised and at the same time not spike unemployment by a couple percentage points, that it shows his lack of super strategerizing power.

There are more than 12 million unemployed right now, and that gives us an official rate of about 10%. Raising the rate “a couple percentage points” would require dumping more than 2 million people on the job market, about the size of the demobilization at the end of WWII.

But let’s all remember how badly that post-WWII demobilization turned out for the economy. We’d all have to move back to Levittown, drive cars with tail fins, and carry tin lunch boxes to our unionized manufacturing jobs. The horrors!

actor – keep in mind the numbers below are pre-surge:

In 2003, 387,920 troops were stationed on foreign soil.This figure is out of a total of 1,434,377 personnel. Deployments have ranged from a high of 1,082,777 troops in 1968 to a low of 206,002 in 1999.

To get back to 1999 levels would mean from 200K to 250K extra soldiers ‘sitting around in US bases’ as some upthread say would happen. Which it would, maybe for a little while, but the ‘peace dividend’ of the 90s shows that what really happens is bases start getting closed.

My problem is that I don’t think Obama has the political guts (I think he has the imagination) to do such a draw-down and put the returning troops to work via more economic stimulus or a domestic work corps.

As others have pointed out upthread, that would actually save us money, with the benefit of getting infrastructure built, the green economy kick-started, etc., plus putting people to work.

Source: The Heritage Foundation (I know, I know) – http://www.heritage.org/research/nationalsecurity/cda04-11.cfm

SteveB – I take your point. A ‘couple of percentage points’ was clearly a wrong statement. Consider this, though – I’m guessing ‘unemployed veteran’ is more scary to Obama in a ‘politically toxic’ way than ‘unemployed regular person’.

My problem is that I don’t think Obama has the political guts (I think he has the imagination) to do such a draw-down and put the returning troops to work via more economic stimulus or a domestic work corps.

I’m not sure I agree with you. For example, in the Pentagon budget is an earmark for the ACEngineers. They can always use extra hands to do grunt work, especially now that Obama has mandated infrastructure improvements.

It’s not as simple as bringing them home. There’s a whole “posse comitatus” concept that he’d have to deal with unless he a) had them sitting around bases or b) had them working for the ACE.

My guess is the regular army folks will get redeployed to Afghani-Pakistan and South Korea. The Guardsmen will have to come home, of course.

door number three!

DA, I love you like a pseudonymous sibling I’ve never met, but holy fuck. There’s no way Obama would keep people dying because he can’t remember the government can pay people to dig holes or paint murals.

He’s training them as concentration camp guards for when he rounds Lou Pritchett and all the other keyboardin’ rebels.

tigrismus – yo, sis! thanks! Gotta go to work now and I will reply at length later, but the short version is, that’s not what I’m saying. I think Obama is deeply enamored of the ‘orderly wind-down’ as a solution to almost all problems, which means he does not make bold moves in some instances where he really should. More on that later.

I’m guessing ‘unemployed veteran’ is more scary to Obama in a ‘politically toxic’ way than ‘unemployed regular person’.

How politically scary is “veteran going to college for four years on the newly-expanded GI bill?”

How about applying Occam’s razor? Obama wants to escalate the war in Afghanistan because he believes, as he has said repeatedly, that Afghanistan is the “Central front in the war on terror.” He’s sending more troops to Afghanistan because he wants to win. Period. There’s really no need to invent spurious explanations for his actions.

SteveB,

OK, but then how about the Iraq timeline? Violence is down now, and it seems like the Iraqis can handle the stuff Sadr is throwing at them.

He must be opposing transparency because of all the GS-17 Federal Redacting Tape Specialists it would un-employ.

We’re in the middle of two oil wars and you dipshit pwoggie-bloggie oh-so-superior mealy-mouthed lesser-evil fuckwits think your fucking God-Emperor is worried about fucking unemployment??? Maybe you should consider sticking to making fun of dumbass wingnuts, Ari. You sneering little do-nothing turds are the ones who elected this murderous corporate-owned clown. Now fucking soak in it.

You sneering little do-nothing turds are the ones who elected this murderous corporate-owned clown.

I do not for a moment regret my vote for Zombie Ronald McDonald.

Maybe you should consider sticking to making fun of dumbass wingnuts

You don’t stick around long enough for us to mock, Alan.

I do not for a moment regret my vote for Zombie Ronald McDonald.

hey!!

I figured he was a relative of yours, zrm. And thus an okay Joe.

Slate 2004 –

“Today, the military units stationed in Germany spend most of their energy on Iraq. Ramstein Air Base and the U.S. Air Force units there serve as a logistics and transportation hub for operations; the Landstuhl military hospital at Ramstein takes care of serious U.S. casualties from Iraq. …”

I suspect it is still true…

Rahm Emanuel and Alan Smithee walk into a bar…

…sitting at the bar are several sockpuppets, behind it, a strawman.

Barman asks, “Is there a 12 inch pianist in the punch line?”

You have got to be shitting me, DA.

but what about all of the contractors!!!

Think of the Millions and Millions of Contractors who would be thrown out of work if we stopped fooling around with play acting in both the DOD and the rest of the intelligence community. { many of whom are not even americans who would be able to add to the american economy. Why should we be shipping tax dollars to outerRurithania because some contractor for AFES got a good deal on them as the labor to sell ice cream…. }

So while AN argument can be constructed that this is a way to save folks, one has to really ask if this is a realistic approach to the problem – when the fed could just as easily be sending tax dollars to the various states where they can maintain state employees IN local economies….

Thus getting the obligatory better increase the velocity of money.

Try also to remember that by brining the TROOPS home we are still paying them till we demob them – it is not like they are going to be booted out the door from the plane at Dover or Charleston.

So please. Put DOWN the BONG, and work on a rational idea – or do this as a better Spoof!!!

OK, but then how about the Iraq timeline? Violence is down now, and it seems like the Iraqis can handle the stuff Sadr is throwing at them.

I’m not sure I understand your question, but the Bush administration negotiated a withdrawal timeline with the Iraqi government before Obama was even elected, and Obama is merely complying with that agreement, to the letter.

If you want to thank anyone for our withdrawal from Iraq, please thank the Iraqi resistance.

Steve, he’s talked about extending the timeline he himself committed to on the campaign trail.

While I R alwayz full of teh luvz and admiration for all things SadlyNautical, I have to put in my two frustrated cents here. Why do y’all think B. Hussein can whisk the soldiers back immediatement? You know (and y’all certainly ought to, being painfully employed and all) that it takes up to two years to plan and execute a single project in the work world, which (mostly) does not involve human bodies and lives. I mean, plan a software project, it takes two years or more, research the market, talk to the customers, determine the need, storyboard the mofo, trim or add bells and whistles as needed, assign headcount, hire as needed, prepare budgets and plans and get them approved, roll in needed bugfixes, inform customers of bugs that will not be fixed, prepare and distribute sales and marketing materials, plan rollouts and conferences, prepare schedules for each worker involved, assign tasks according to schedule, et cetera ad infinitum, ad nauseam.

Some of the army currently in Iraq, and also, possibly, in Afghanistan, are reservists, who will have to be demobbed, unless they opt to sign up (not likely, reservists tend to be older, with family, and not career army). Given the contraction of the economy, those people can kiss their former jobs goodbye, especially if they’ve been stop-lossed since 2003. Six years is WAY too long to hold someone’s job in this economy. Plus, in case anyone’s forgotten, our Prime Tool in Iraq, Nouri al-Maliki, is doing his best to establish a Shi’a Iraq, which means ensuring (with our help) that the Sunni are dis- or un-armed and rendered as powerless as he can make them.

It’s a combination of all those issues that makes for the foot-dragging on this. Prez O isn’t going to tell teh people that we’re changing the date because the Iraqis need us there a little longer. At least, I don’t think he is. Loss of face for all involved. And trying to explain teh details will simply have the crazies on both sides screaming “Bleaaargh! We R beingk cheated, lied to, and otherwise oppressed!!” People don’t seem to realize that it took between 8 and 12 years to scrape rock bottom and expecting it all to be fixed and shiny within four months betrays a childish lack of grasp of nuance that, frankly, annoys and frightens me. Mommy make it bedda NOW! Sheesh.

expecting it all to be fixed and shiny within four months betrays a childish lack of grasp of nuance…

Find me one person who’s complaining that Obama hasn’t fixed all of our problems in four months. Just one.

My complaint isn’t that Obama’s being too slow about undoing the wrongs of the Bush administration, it’s that he’s actually doubling down on Bush’s policies in Afghanistan, and with executive privilege and secrecy. And, in each case, the policy, whether it’s more troops for Afghanistan, or asserting that the government be immune from lawsuits over illegal wiretapping, is the result of an executive decision, and so can’t be justified on the basis that “we don’t have the votes in Congress” to do something else.

It’s simply not the case that Obama is being forced to do these things against his will. If he’s sending more men into the Afghan meatgrinder, or claiming that he should have the right to keep torture photos secret, it’s because that’s what he wants to do.

The jobs thing doesn’t wash. Just because you close those cold war relics doesn’t mean you discharge the service members. Bring them home and spread them out in bases across the US. They then begin to spend there money in US communities helping our economy not Germany’s, Italy’s and Japan’s.

Nobody expects OBama to wave a magic wand and fix all of the problems. But shit, it’s always easier to argue with the faeries in your head rather than real people.

The problem is, Obama isn’t even trying, He’s actively making things worse.

I’m really not sure what to make of it, seeing as how apparently we’ve reached the point where fully half of our forces in Iraq and Afghanistan are mercenaries private contractors

Private contractors in I & A are funded by the federal government, thanks to Bush who facilitated their astronomical rise (and stuffed their greedy maws with greenbacks). They also earn a lot more than government employed soldiers.

Vagrant said, “Bringing the troops home doesn’t mean discharging them into civilian life. Hypothesis fail.”

National Guard = Vagrant Fail.

He had wisdom enough to understand that digging holes in Colorado was not such a bad assignment in wartime. Since the holes were in no great demand, he could dig them and fill them up at a leisurely pace, and he was seldom overworked.

mdhatter beat me to it. Also, I’m sure all the Stop-Lossed soldiers will totally stand for being Stop-Lossed even for stateside service. I’m sure that wouldn’t cause some major political problems for Obama, either.

Speaking of daring not speak its name, why is it that when it comes to war and to Obama’s failings, we on the left suddenly turn into conservatives in the “Saying it out loud is endorsing it wholeheartedly” department?

Why do y’all think B. Hussein can whisk the soldiers back immediatement? You know (and y’all certainly ought to, being painfully employed and all) that it takes up to two years to plan and execute a single project in the work world, which (mostly) does not involve human bodies and lives.

Jebus. Somehow people manage to fight entire wars in less time than that.

Plus, in case anyone’s forgotten, our Prime Tool in Iraq, Nouri al-Maliki, is doing his best to establish a Shi’a Iraq, which means ensuring (with our help) that the Sunni are dis- or un-armed and rendered as powerless as he can make them.

Ethnic cleansing is fun! (What Sunni awakening? You have always been at war with the Sunni.)

Prez O isn’t going to tell teh people that we’re changing the date because the Iraqis need us there a little longer.

That’s nice. They don’t want you there.

And trying to explain teh details will simply have the crazies on both sides screaming “Bleaaargh! We R beingk cheated, lied to, and otherwise oppressed!!”

Yeah, an occupied population would have to be crazy to feel like that, so they don’t need to hear any details! Fuck you.

Well, I, for one, am heartened! I long ago gave up the comments here as a retarded wasteland of inside jokes and fake trolls, but it’s encouraging to see so many people pissing all over one of the most shockingly stupid attempts at apologetics I’ve ever seen (and that includes D.A.’s earlier classic where he argued, contra Mencken, that Obama’s many obvious milquetoast failings should make us even more enthused about voting for him.

Of course, there were only 70 comments when I checked. I imagine the next several hundred will get back on the usual track.

Emperor – can I quote you on my resume?

Also, just to clarify – I didn’t mean to phrase the original question in such a binary way. I don’t think concerns about unemployment are the single factor in Obama’s apparent decision to keep overseas troops at their current levels, except where he’s increasing them (in Afghanistan). I just think it is probably one factor in the administration’s current thinking. And it ‘dare not speak its name’ because the military is essentially the one ‘make work’ government program that is acceptable in the context of the wingnut-tilted Overton Window — only you can never call it a ‘make work’ program, because that means you hate the troops.

Saying that Obama lacks the stones or the impulse to change this, isn’t exactly showering him with praise or an attempt at apologetics, I don’t think. Though it may well be ‘shockingly stupid’ as per Emperor USA.

I don’t think some people understand how a military service works. Servicemen and women on bases abroad aren’t sitting around in the barracks waiting on a “just maybe.” They have real jobs, just like the rest of us. They work in offices, they are MPs, they are mechanics, cooks, janitors, lawyers, &c. Life in the military is not a Bill Murray movie. If you close a base and bring them home then, yes you have to provide them jobs here, too! Duh!

And of course, they can be mustered out of uniform and into the reserve, if the service chooses to do so. That’s what a military Reserve is, “inactive” duty.

My own opinion is that the unemployment issue is likely a factor in decisions like these. There are also legal limits on what the military can do onshore. So, it’s not the case that you can just march them out to fix the roads or clear brush in the national forest. But, I think ultimately the major consideration is that it’s just not a priority item for Obama. I think he has a list, at the top of which are economic recovery, close down Iraq intervention, foreground Afghanistan, Palestine, and probably some others. He’s focussed on those and excluding pretty much everything else. It’s hard to say how much of his current positioning is based on actual conception and how much is based on political convenience.

But then, I didn’t have high expectations of him. I expect him to be competent but not great President. So far, that is born out.

Thanks.

mp

Hey, fuck you too, Windy. Thanks for the windbaggery. A little more substance might have helped but gas is easier to produce. FWIW, I was NOT referring to the Iraqis at all, since they have no voice whatsoever. If anyone thinks they have more rights under al-Maliki than they did under Saddam, such people should be shipped there pronto to examine those rights close up. I was referring to American crazies who are proving they have teh crazy in abundance, these days. While some are shooting soldiers, others are shooting museum-goers.

As for “the Iraqis” wanting or needing American troops, once again, it ain’t the people wot are being consulted. It’s our stooges and tools. What do you propose, that we dump al-Maliki and let the Sunni and Shi’a fight it out till a leader is found who is acceptable to all? With the exodus of the secular, educated population, chances are it’ll be some mullah or the other.

I’d respond to the rest of your comment, but it’s a waste of time. I’m with nyambol on this. It’s not easy to schlep X thousand people from one location to another in X days flat. Logistics, planning, prep. Yes, everybody wants to be home yesterday. But that won’t make them any more thankful when they suddenly realize they haven’t got an income and jobs are not to be found. Hell, I’ve been looking for two years myself, with precious little luck.

As for Obama, he is the best and most competent person THAT WE COULD ELECT. There may be better and more competent people for the position, but either they’re not interested, or they’re not electable. DA says O’s got a list of priorities. I tend to agree. It’s not an easy job he’s got and he’s doing fine. The comments about his milquetoastiness I disagree with. I think he’s behaving more like an Asian than an American, in that he’s trying for consensus on most issues. Maybe that’s my own skewed Asian viewpoint. Feel free to yell s’more.

FWIW, I was NOT referring to the Iraqis at all, since they have no voice whatsoever.

I know you weren’t. I was mocking your inability to consider that they should have a voice, or that, God forbid, Obama should listen to them.

I think he’s behaving more like an Asian than an American, in that he’s trying for consensus on most issues.

Interesting. Is it typically Asian behavior to shoot up sovereign allies with drone missiles and to cover up war crimes?

Also, no few of these service people are reservists who will drop directly back to the civilian job market. Some had jobs held for them, but that probably isn’t true for the majority.

As for Obama, he is the best and most competent person THAT WE COULD ELECT.

Wonderful conclusion, completely devoid of supporting facts, and essentially a distraction because it assumes there are only two choices, Mastodon or Unicorn.

I realize you Unicorn-Lovers can’t fathom that it’s possible to avoid supporting the lesser evil, and that it’s possible to actually pursue real changes. Yes, I realize that. But as long as you’re mired in fantasy land, and have your noggins filled with such lies as “electability” and the like, you’re going to keep believing in the fantasy of the Magical Unicorn.

Here’s a quick reminder for you: back during the primaries, just the Unicorn primaries, there were a number of choices far better than Empire-Boy Obama-the-Liar, Corporate Slattern Clinton-the-Zionist, Fake Populist Edwards-the-Playboy. but sadly you idiotic Unicorn-Lovers listened to Rahm Emanuel, Jim Carville, Howie Dean, the DNC and the DLC and started just blindly accepting the lies that real alternatives do not exist because of “electoral supermajorities” and the like.

If any of you Unicorn-Lovers knew the faintest thing about how American government works, you wouldn’t have this problem of massive delusion. But instead you let others tell you, in lying tones, what THEY want you to believe is the story of Fed Govt Electoral Politics. And you’ll all be damned before you’ll skeptically question what one of your beloved “experts” tells you.

I suggest waiting for Keith Olbermann’s input. Failed sportscasters are the most prescient analysts of Fed Politics. How do I know this? You Unicorn-Lovers tell me so!