Nomenclature

Congratulations to ABC News for getting the photo of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab's underpants. The explosives, we are told, already had been removed, and it seems some portion of the nefarious underpants were destroyed by fire — but they still look pretty skimpy to me. Really, they don't look like my concept of Muslim underpants at all. They look, well, suspiciously European.

Anyway, I was disappointed to hear major media referring to Abdulmutallab as "the Christmas Day Bomber," which does not in any way reflect the crazed fanaticism of a man willing to use his cock as a fuse. I was leaning towards "the Underpants Bomber," a parallel to "Shoe Bomber" Richard Reed. Then, on American Public Radio's Marketplace, I heard Abdulmutallab referred to as a "crotch bomber."

Thank you, as always, Public Radio! Perfect!

The Naughts

Everybody seems to agree that the past decade has been pretty crappy. Some like to blame the Bush administration, but I don't. Granted, Bush and his cronies were incompetent and corrupt, but they were just the culmination (I hope) of a process that started with Reagan in 1981.

How anybody ever managed to believe in supply-side economics and monetarism is beyond me, but when you consider how many people believe the world is less than 6,000 years old, I guess making the jump to supply-side is not that difficult. Anyway, I don't think that political leaders ever bothered to believe any economic theory at all. Starting with Reagan, they were just corporatists — dancing at the ends of strings in the hands of lobbyists and bankers.

The result is our current plutocracy — a system that neither the Obama administration nor any significant portion of Congress seems at all inclined to unwind. The fact that the events of the past 10 years have demonstrated, over and over, that the "magic of the market" is entirely mythical makes no difference to those in power. They feel obliged to keep spouting the same anti-regulatory, anti-tax nonsense — and for good reason.

They're bought and paid for.

Don't expect much to change. Health reform won't be allowed to infringe on the profit margins of hospitals, insurance companies, or pharmaceutical manufacturers. If our troops ever are withdrawn from Afghanistan (or even Iraq), there will be new places to invade for the benefit of military contractors. Somewhere on Wall Street, the next bubble is taking shape, and nothing will be done to break up the banks that are "too big to fail."

I'm guessing the "naughts" will go on a while longer. There's nothing in sight to bring them to an end.

Oh Bloody Hell!

You all remember (who could forget?) the outcome of "shoe bomber" Richard Reed's attempt to blow up his sneakers. Well, our latest failed bomber, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, had his bomb materials hidden in his underwear. Yes. His underwear.

Granted, naked air travel might be more comfortable — but there still wouldn't be enough leg space for anybody who wasn't a midget or a double amputee. More immediately, though, the airlines now have an excuse to stop providing blankets.

Personally speaking, my air travel hasn't been curtailed by terrorists — the fucking airlines managed it all on their own.

Reinhold Niebuhr?

Yes. Reinhold Niebuhr. Evil exists, and sometimes we have to respond in ways we might not like. Okay — but what does that have to do with escalation in Afghanistan, especially when there are other alternatives? True, Obama is not Bush — but who the hell is, except Bush (or somebody else with Cheney's arm up his ass)? Nobel Peace Prize. Bah!

When a country is as corrupt as Afghanistan, the best way to bring peace is to buy it — not with troops and blood, but with money. Nobody can convince me we can't buy every last warlord and Karzai relative for a hell of a lot less — not even including lives — than we're currently spending on goddamned "nation building." Someday, perhaps, Afghan girls will be able to go to school, choose abortion, and belittle their husbands' dick size — but it won't be a result of anything American troops do in Afghanistan over the next ten years or so.

In the meanwhile, I couldn't care less that the Senate looks ready to kill the so-called "public option." The CBO has reported, as anybody with half an economic brain could have predicted, that the House version of the public option probably would cost more than private plans. The only way a public option can make a difference is if it is available to large employers, or others who can guarantee large numbers of plan participants.

The idea of people in the 55 to 64 age bracket being able to buy into Medicare is a lot more interesting. If the employers of people in the 55 to 64 age bracket are allowed to buy them Medicare instead of whatever they're buying for the rest of their employees, there could be some real savings. That, of course, won't happen.

The Plan for Afghanistan

Well, I suppose it's nice that there's some kind of plan for the continuing US involvement in Afghanistan, even though I'm afraid it was shaped at least as much by domestic politics as by any sort of strategic considerations or overriding international objectives. As usual, the President weaseled down the middle: he offered up three-quarters of the troops the military (and the Republicans) wanted, plus a probably futile attempt to get the other 10 thousand from NATO; a promise to start drawing down troops in 18 months; and an unenforceable threat against Hamid Karzai that is very unlikely to persuade someone quite so corrupt to crack down on corruption.

Here's my prediction: eighteen months from now, the usual warlords will continue to be the real rulers of the Afghan countryside, although, if we're lucky, some will be nominally on our side rather than nominally supporting the Taliban. If we're really lucky, the major population centers the administration plan seeks to protect will be a little safer, although protecting a city like Kabul against suicide bombers requires a degree of authoritarian rigor likely to be beyond the powers of Karzai and McChrystal.

The generals, as usual, will be whining for more troops. Generals don't understand "relatively positive outcomes" — they're taught to believe in an obscure 19th century concept called "victory." Of course, even in the 19th century, nobody achieved that in Afghanistan.

Most important, though, the 2010 elections will be over, and the 2012 elections still will be roughly half a year away. There will be time to maneuver around both contests. What else matters? Both parties are committed to enhancing the prospects for their major contributors, so, of course, the rest of us are left eating their shit.

As for how to go about financing the new Afghan "surge," Obama was totally vague. Here's a suggestion: how about a tax surcharge on war profiteers? Some have done extraordinarily well, especially with their connections to both government and military decision makers. To me, it makes sense to spread some of the pain to those who raked in the profits from Bush's wars.

Want to end all the current bullshit? Easy. Bring back the draft.

Debt Burdens

I graduated from Queens College of the City University of New York in 1967. My instructors all were either tenured or in tenure-track positions — I was never taught by an adjunct. Except for very nominal registration fees, the cost to me was zero.

Queens College still is a bargain. In-state, full time students pay about $5000 a year in tuition, and many qualify for some sort of financial aid. If they're living with their parents, it's manageable — less so for those who must be self-supporting. What I'm wondering, though, is why we no longer can afford to provide free post-secondary education?

Two thirds of those attending college depend on loans to pay their way through, and the average debt upon graduation is over $23,000. Starting out in a job that pays $35,000 a year, such a level of debt is an incredible burden. Starting out in an economy that might not provide any job at all makes the burden far greater. Graduates in bad financial straights may defer payment, but interest continues to accrue.

The result is young people putting their lives on hold. Student debt is one reason for delaying marriage and children. It's also a reason to hang onto essentially crappy jobs — just to keep up with the loan payments. Taking a risk means risking bankruptcy — a bankruptcy where student loans and credit card debt are not forgiven.

We are wasting a hell of a lot of talent by strangling it with debt. If I could get my hands on the throat of a bank that has been collecting government subsidies for offering high interest student loans, I would squeeze. Hard.

I don't have solutions. We are at a point where the evil rich should be hammered into pulp by the collective (Yes! Collective!) baseball bats of virtually everybody else, but don't expect anything from Timmy Geithner, whose asshole is open to the fucking of anybody with sufficient assets.

The New Deal wasn't about economics. It wasn't about socialism. It was about morality. It was about doing the right thing. Now, all of that is lost. Had Roosevelt been able to push through a national health care program, you can bet nobody would be trying to dig up the money to pay for coverage so as to avoid paying fines. Frankly, I think the whole "compromise" with single payer is sickening.

Welcome back to the 19th century. Bend over, working people. There's a lovely assortment of shafts all ready to fuck you — hard.

Obama and the Generals

This morning's New York Times suggests that the Obama administration is ready to send 25,000 to 30,000 new troops to Afghanistan. I rather hope that's a trial balloon, and that the actual number will be less — especially since I took 20,000 in a betting pool.

I figured he'd split the difference between the proposals by McChrystal (40,000) and Biden (0), but who knows? Perhaps the political winds blow more powerfully from the generals than from the Democratic Left — and those assholes who call themselves "moderates" [moderate (n): doesn't know shit from Shinola) have been putting on the pressure to "cooperate" with "the men on the front lines."

For a variety of idiotic reasons, large numbers of Americans think out elected leadership is obliged to do whatever the Generals tell them is "necessary." Obama, who is, as far as I've been able to see so far, a totally political creature, feels he must make due obeisance to that moronic premise.

Maybe I've said this before, but here's what it comes down to: the military can't conceive of any solutions other than military solutions. They're handicapped — the special education boys of the American elite. Lyndon Johnson was afraid to go up against them, and look where that got us. Obama looks like he's about to go down the same road. 20,000 — or 30,000 — won't be enough. Anticipate further escalation in short order.

Needless to say, "national security" will take precedence over any domestic programs that might actually do some good for the American people — not that anything Obama's been doing for the average American has had any impact whatsoever. Wall Street is doing fine, and the companies that were "too big to fail" are even bigger now. As for the rest of America, well...

If Michele Obama were to take on the role of Marie Antoinette, she wouldn't be saying, "Let them eat cake." She'd be saying, "Let them eat shit."