I Was Wrong

and I'm not afraid to admit it. The arming and training of Islamic fundamentalists in Afghanistan by the American government was not begun by Reagan, but in fact was begun at the tail end of Jimmy Carter's presidency. Reagan continued the supply of weapons and experts to help Bin Laden with the goal being to bog down the Soviet military in a Vietnam-esque war in the Middle East. This would demoralize the Soviet military and citizens, bankrupt the Soviet coffers and hasten the collapse of the Soviet Union.

If anyone out there wants a real answer to the question, "Why do they hate us?", I strongly suggest reading Morris Berman's "Dark Ages America".

Mr. Berman calmly and patiently picks apart the tangled threads of American involvement in world affairs from before the Cold War to present day.

To quote Robbie Burns, "O wad some Power the giftie gie us, To see oursels as ithers see us!"

Mr. Burns, had it right, but he was Scottish, not American. Americans love to quote deep thoughts, but they sure don't like to think deep thoughts. And we will never, like the spoiled children that we are, be able to really admit to our faults and wrongs.

It's sort of like Tommy Ravenel getting busted for cocaine. He goes directly to a posh "treatment center", comes back, makes his plea, then returns directly to another posh "treatment center". Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Micheal Miller, the poor black guy, finally gets a reduction in bail so his mom can put up a little bit of property so he can get out of jail after a couple of months.

America is Tommy Ravenel and the rest of the world is Micheal Miller.

And Micheal Miller is getting pissed and maybe Tommy should do some soul searching about the way he lives his life and treats people and his automatic assumption that he is superior to all because of his wealth/skin color/religion/whatever.

And the beat, according to the great American philosophers Sonny and Cher, goes on.


Loki sez: Sheesh, you're depressing this morning. More silly cat pictures!