dictator Archives - Where Is The Outrage?

A few things that are bouncing around my brain

Cool video on Dark Matter:

I was kind of surprised that Senator Marco Rubio while talking about the death of dictator Muammar Qaddafi managed to thank British and French troops (warning: this link opens an audio file), but not American troops. I just found that interesting. A Republican thanking foreign troops first – curious.

There seems to be lots of people who are curious about how Muammar Qaddafi died. I’m sorry, maybe I’m just not inquisitive. I simply don’t care. I don’t care if a lightning bolt from Zeus hit him in the head or a sniper took him out at 300 yards with a 10 mile an hour cross breeze. I simply don’t care. From my standpoint, I’m happy for the Libyan people. They needed the dictator either captured or killed so that they could move on. Now they get to the difficult task of trying to make a nation out of Libya. Running a government is a lot harder than overthrowing the government. Running a government that respects all of your people is even harder. By the way, I wasn’t interested in the gruesome photos of Saddam Hussein or the photos of his sons when they were killed. Maybe it’s because I get enough blood and guts and work that I don’t need to see them at home. Maybe it’s because the blood and guts are beside the point.

Charles Blow has been writing some absolutely fabulous articles/op-eds in the New York Times. He has served up another one. This one is about Occupy Wall Street. There are a lot of people who feel a kinship with those who are doing the “occupying.”

Bank failure #84. Yes, there’ve been 84 bank failures so far this year.

According to the Financial Time,s the bondholders of Greek debt are expected to take a 60% loss on their current holdings.

I’ll have a little bit more on this later but I thought I’d start off now. Skeptics of global warming, some curmudgeon scientists, decided to prove once and for all that global warming was nothing but a bunch of hooey. They took a bunch of data than they crunched all the numbers and guess what, they found out what every other climate scientists of any stature has found out, that global warming is for real.

10 years since the anthrax attacks. There have been so many different things going on in the last 10 years, I really have not had a chance to delve into this case. I haven’t looked at the evidence. I know that both Glenn and Jim White have been following this case with more than a passing interest.

As I mentioned several days ago, Herman Cain’s 9-9-9 plan is nothing more than a fancy flat tax. Robert Reich agrees.

We should enjoy a little music on a Friday night:

Artist: Stan Getz and Astrud Gilberto
Tune: The Girl from Ipanema

By ecthompsonmd|2011-10-22T00:00:02-04:00October 22nd, 2011|Economy, Music, Occupy Wall Street, Science, Terrorism|Comments Off

Time to Come Home

Today, President Obama has announced that all American troops are coming home from Iraq by the end of the year. I’m sure that there is going to be a lot of discussion and finger-pointing over time tables and such. In my opinion, it is past time for our troops to come home. We’ve lost too many Americans. Unfortunately, after much thought and consideration, it is difficult for me to come up with much that we’ve accomplished. We got rid of Saddam Hussein. Everyone will acknowledge that he was a dictator and a mass murderer. As we began what will no doubt be a protracted discussion on what was accomplished and when should we come home, I think it is important for us to remember our goals. 🙂 I have to smile because our goals have changed over the last 8-10 years. Originally, our goals were to prevent Saddam Hussein from launching an attack on the United States or our allies with weapons of mass destruction (nuclear weapons, chemical weapons or biological weapons). As everyone now knows, we found no weapons of mass destruction – none. There were multiple other reasons placed out there in the ethernet which included securing Iraqi oil for the United States, freeing the Iraqi people from the brutal dictatorship of Saddam Hussein, freeing Iraq from the terrorists calling themselves Al Qaeda in Iraq and finally, the domino effect. By taking out Saddam Hussein and instilling democracy in Iraq, democracy would spread throughout the Middle East.

I’m ecstatic that our troops are coming home. I am deeply saddened that we spent over $800 billion (more than our economic stimulus package) and have so little to show for it. Over 4400 Americans have been killed and over 32,000 have been wounded. I know that our troops have fought bravely. I’m in awe of their sacrifice and dedication to duty.

Mister President – let’s bring them home quickly and safely.

By ecthompsonmd|2011-10-21T19:37:51-04:00October 21st, 2011|Iraq, Obama administration|Comments Off

Grab bag Monday

How are you this evening?

Several years ago, as I was searching for a theme for my blog, I started watching the O’Reilly factor. I would listen to his rant and then I would post the rant plus whatever I thought he got wrong or distorted. I got tired of documenting the egregious errors of Fox news. I just figured that Fox doesn’t care. They are going to say what they want to say regardless of the facts. (watch the video)

Libya confuses me. Libya’s dictator Muammar Gaddafi appears to be a repugnant dictator with little or no redeeming qualities. If he gets overthrown, ousted or otherwise booted out of power… This would be a good thing for the United States and for the world. It would be a great thing for the Libyan people. This thing is very complex. So, after a series of moves, a ragtag coalition has come together to enforce “no-fly zones” over Libya. On one hand, I think this is a good thing. I think that letting Gaddafi indiscriminately kill his own people is simply wrong. Does this riddle have a military solution? I think we all remember the genocide that went on in Rwanda in the mid-1990s. We should not let that kind of killing go on again, ever. On the other hand, what is our goal? Is our goal to destroy every airplane and helicopter that Colonel Gaddafi owns? Is that enough? As I see it, there are many pitfalls to this strategy. Remember Somalia? We were just delivering humanitarian aid. Then we were going to stop folks for stealing the aid. Then there is this serviceman being drug threw the streets. Finally, if the former Russian president, Vladimir Putin, opposes this action, I’m thinking this action is a good thing.
A federal appeals court has reinstated a case against the government which was filed by the ACLU and multiple other groups. The case contends that it is unconstitutional for the executive branch to vacuum up all this information found in e-mails and international phone calls.
I find it interesting that the Obama administration is not going to ask for any funding for this Libya campaign. By the way, how much military action can a president engage our troops in without Congressional approval?
Former Minnesota governor has made it official, sort of. Tim Pawlenty has formed an exploratory committee. He has really been running for president for the last 2 years. I’m not sure what this committee is for. He knows where he stands with the American public. He has been monitoring his status for the last 24 months.
ATT is going to buy T-Mobile. Is this good for you and I? I can’t think of a single merger that has happened in the last 10 – 15 years that has benefited the American consumer. Watch Morningstar’s thoughts on this takeover.

BTW, if the Tea Party throws a convention and nobody shows up (about 300), does that mean that the Tea Party was just a fad?

By ecthompsonmd|2011-03-21T20:56:47-04:00March 21st, 2011|Congress, Foreign Affairs, Media, Obama administration|Comments Off