SECRETARY OF DEFENSE, KILLING BLACKS

THE ABSURD TIMES

 

Yes, New York killed a fat black man.  Everybody is busy blaming a Nazi-like cop for it, and yes, he did kill the guy.  but nobody yet tells you WHY he was told to kill the guy.

What was his crime?  Why was he being arrested?  Well, for selling "loose" cigarettes.  That means ones that had not yet been taxed. Well, the city tax on them is 66% of the purchase price or something like 5 or 6 dollars a pack!  And the cops are told to stop that type of crime at all costs.  Let the women get raped, but make sure the taxes are paid.

This tax was instituted to save New Yorkers from themselves, and probably by the same rich nut that decided that 24 ounce soft drinks were too big and caused obesity.  Hey, yeah, and that fat black man was obese too!  Two crimes.  

Maybe it is time to look at some of the causes of these crimes in economic terms, not in racial ones?  Or maybe both. 

Oh, yeah, Chuck Hagel is fired, as you know.  So, it was probably him who called Nitwit Yahoo "Chicken Shit".  He certainly is the only high official in the White House who didn't apologize and fall all over himself crying about the remark.  Even if he didn't make it, he probably said, when asked, "well, so?" 

Anyway, this new guy, Carter, will have no trouble as lots of big capitalist weapons producing companies are on his side.  Here's a story on that:

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 4, 2014

Out Cheneying-Cheney: Obama’s Likely Defense Pick Once Backed Pre-emptive Attack on North Korea

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President Obama is reportedly preparing to nominate former Deputy Defense Secretary Ashton Carter to replace ousted Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel. A trained physicist, Carter has a long history at the Pentagon, where he once served as the chief arms buyer. In 2006, he made headlines when he backed a pre-emptive strike against North Korea if the country continued with plans to conduct a test launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile. He co-wrote a piece headlined "If Necessary, Strike and Destroy." We speak to Alice Slater, New York director of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation and a member of the Abolition 2000 coordinating committee.

TRANSCRIPT

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

NERMEEN SHAIKH: We end today’s show with the man first in line to be the next secretary of defense. Obama administration officials have said Ashton Carter heads the White House shortlist to replace outgoing Chuck Hagel. On Tuesday, White House spokesperson Josh Earnest responded to questions about the nominee.

PRESS SECRETARY JOSH EARNEST: Mr. Carter is obviously somebody who has generated a lot of headlines today. He is somebody who has previously served the administration as the deputy secretary of defense, a position that he filled very, very ably. He was confirmed by the United States Senate into that position in September of 2011 with—by unanimous consent. So this is an indication that he fulfills some of the criteria that we’ve discussed in the past. He’s somebody that certainly deserves and has demonstrated strong bipartisan support for his—for his previous service in government. He is somebody that does have a detailed understanding of the way that the Department of Defense works.

AMY GOODMAN: An announcement will come after the official vetting process is complete, but Carter is said to be the only candidate left after two others withdrew from consideration. His appointment will require approval from the Republican-led Senate. Chuck Hagel was pushed out last week amidst reported differences with the administration’s military campaign in Iraq and Syria. A trained physicist, Carter has a long history at the Pentagon, where he served as the chief arms buyer. He was also assistant secretary of defense under former President Bill Clinton and deputy defense secretary from 2011 to 2013.

To find out more about Ashton Carter, we go to Alice Slater, New York director of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation and a member of the Abolition 2000 coordinating committee.

You’re deeply concerned about Ashton Carter being named secretary of defense.

ALICE SLATER: I am.

AMY GOODMAN: Why?

ALICE SLATER: Because it’s business as usual. I mean, it’s the perpetuation of what Eisenhower warned about the military-industrial complex. This is somebody that has rotated inside and outside of industry. He’s advised Goldman Sachs and other business companies on what kind of military equipment, you know, they shouldn’t be manufacturing, and they’ve been doing deals for years. And he was brought in because Hagel was kind of like—well, not exactly the peace movement, but they were going to ratchet down dumb wars, anyway, which is what Obama said. And now it looks like we’re just expanding the whole war machine. And he’s a perfect candidate for this. I mean, it’s really pathetic, because he actually wrote an op-ed that we should be bombing North Korea’s nuclear power plant. And—

NERMEEN SHAIKH: Well, I’d like to go to that, actually, that op-ed. In 2006, in aWashington Post op-ed, written with former Defense Secretary William Perry, Ashton Carter urged the Bush administration to launch a pre-emptive strike against North Korea if the country continued with plans to conduct a test launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile. In the piece headlined, "If Necessary, Strike and Destroy," Perry and Carter wrote, quote, "Should the United States allow a country openly hostile to it and armed with nuclear weapons to perfect an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of delivering nuclear weapons to U.S. soil? We believe not." They went on to say, quote, "if North Korea persists in its launch preparations, the United States should immediately make clear its intention to strike and destroy the North Korean Taepodong missile before it can be launched."

ALICE SLATER: And actually, Cheney criticized them. The peaceful Cheney said they had gone too far. That’s where we’re at now. It’s the same gang. I mean, I’m particularly upset with Ashton Carter because I’m so familiar with the whole nuclear disarmament process, or re-armament process, I should say. Right now our government is planning to spend $1 trillion over the next 30 years for new bomb factories, delivery systems, missiles, submarines, airplanes and new nuclear weapons. And he has been part of the push, particularly starting when Clinton, President Clinton, signed the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty in 1993, which we had been working for all our adult lives. They had this little kicker that they allowed laboratory tests and subcritical tests. What’s a subcritical test? They’re blowing up plutonium at the test site a thousand feet below the desert floor—they’ve done 26 of them—with high explosives, but it doesn’t have a—

AMY GOODMAN: Where?

ALICE SLATER: In Nevada, at the Nevada test site. And because it doesn’t have a chain reaction, Clinton said, "That’s not a test. We can do this." Like "I didn’t inhale, I didn’t have sex, and I’m not doing nuclear testing." And that’s why India tested, because India objected, after the test ban was signed, to the technical laboratory tests and the subcritical tests and said, "If you don’t preclude that in the test ban," which Carter was advising at that time, "we’re not going to sign it." And then India went and developed their weapons. And—

AMY GOODMAN: He advised Clinton on deploying a missile shield in Alaska?

ALICE SLATER: Well, he was talking to him that it would be OK, you know, that it didn’t violate the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. That was his advice. Well, Russia disagreed. And then Clinton started the big—the infrastructure for these missile—the expansion of the missiles. We had a treaty since 1972 with Russia, the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. In order to stop the missile race, we wouldn’t build anti-missiles, so we wouldn’t need so many missiles. And Bush actually walked out of the treaty. That wasn’t Carter, but they started the inroads. And now we have missiles in Poland, Romania, Yugoslavia—not Yugoslavia, Turkey. We took missiles out of Turkey. Kennedy took missiles out of Turkey in order to get the Soviets out of Cuba, and now we’ve got them back in there. And everybody’s saying Putin’s a bad guy; meanwhile, we’re pushing them right up against the wall.

AMY GOODMAN: Well, Alice Slater, I want to thank you for being with us, New York director of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation. She is headed to Vienna for the conference, International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, or ICAN. To see ourconversation in Vienna a few weeks ago about this conference, you can go to democracynow.org.

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Palin, Cops, Beer, and Healthcare

THE ABSURD TIMES

Illustration: Sarah Palin by Hugh Ralinovsky. Actually, the paraphrase makes more sense than anything she actually said. Below is the address of a clip of William Shattner reading her farewell speech (NBC forced Youtube to take it off because of copyright violations, cheap bastards). However, in the interest of accuracy (as if that's relevent when mentioning Palin), the "poem" is really taken from statement she made on her Twitter account and read by some masochist:

www.tonightshowwithconanobrien.com/video/clips/shatner-does-palin-072709/1139665/ -

The only real disturbing thought I have about all of this is that there are millions of voters out there who adore her and would vote for her.

A lot has happened recently. Keep in mind I'm not making this up, ok?

Awhile ago, a policeman was dispatched to a home in Harvard Square in Cambridge, Mass. A prominent Professor was just returning from a trip to China and had trouble getting into his own home. He finally did get in, at which time the officer entered the home and asked for his identification. He produced a Harvard ID and a drivers license, proving that he was the lawful resident of the home. He then asked the officer for his badge number and name. The conversation was not the most polite, but the officer then arrested Professor Gates for Disorderly Conduct and handcuffed him, showing this black man who was the real boss.

At a press conference on healthcare, Barak Obama was answering questions when the last question was about the incident and he remarked that the police had "acted stupidly."

I pause for a definition here: A political Gaffe occurs when a politician tells the truth when it it not in his best interest to. So, Obama committed a Gaffe -- pretty unusual for him.

Now I have a friend from Chicago named Peter Verochensko, better known as Pete. Pete was usually found after work hours at the local tavern on a barstool watching sports on TV, or Aerobics when the instructor was female.

I was telling him this story to get the reactions of a real Chicagoan.

As things heated up, poor policeman attacked by the President, another black man who was the Henry Gates' friend, Obama suggested that he mispoke and that all three should meet at the White House for a beer.

I was about to tell about all the discussion of what brand of beer, the President being called Racist on the F* channel, and so on, but Pete stopped me.

"Wadda minute willya? Did ya say A beer? Singular? Wat is dat? Is he insultin dem or insultin beer? Ya wanna drink beer, get bout tree cases and sit by duh TV and DRINK BEER! I'm not votin' no more."

I pointed out that he had never voted anyway, and he said "Serves dem right fer shuttin down da bars. Usta be ya could get a few free ones if ya voted."

A major concern now is that none of them chose Samuel Adams beer, one that is owned by Americans. All the others are owned abroad. Milwaukee? Forgeddaboutit. Pete was not interested and I heard him turn on the TV.

I started to ask Pete what he thought about the Boston Cop who called either Gates or Omama a "jungle monkey," and he said "Guy gotta be an old fart. Hey! Da Sox game is startin' and it's in HD. Bye," and I knew from past experience that I wouldn't hear from him for weeks.

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Now the Health Care Legislation has been stopped for a few weeks. The well-funded agencies, paid by the insurance companies, are distributing commercials that say, for example, elderly people will no longer be eligable for life saving operations but they will have to pay for abortions, doubtless for "teenage immigrant welfare mothers on drugs."

All sort of scare tactics will be used. It is almost certain that even the American people will be influenced by them. Meanwhile, the Republicans will be in lock-step against it.

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I'm wondering if this planet is worth the effort. Perhaps global warming is a good idea as it will eradicate the Human Race and then the planet will heal itself again and some new life-form will emrege?

We can only hope.

Or, as Pete says, "Fergeddaboutit!"

One of You sent the following observations:

There was a time a few years back when doctors went on strike or some such and it turned out fewer people died during that time. Maybe we will discover a similar phenomenon with the furloughs of civil workers in government? But don't expect that to lead to permanent layoffs. For one, they'd become unemployed and at very high wages.

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Another thought I have is with fewer jobs, and diminished revenue, what balances the equation is a sudden drop in people being a drain on the downsized society. Traditioinally this is carried out through plague and war. This time they may be carefully orchestrated - a so called terrorist incident or the swine flu. Notice it affected the young and fit the most. Oh well, one can go crazy imagining conspiracies. Like imagine one where they poison all the junk food, so only health nuts survive?