It is a terribly cynical view, but one has to wonder if the push to bomb Syria even though the nation is largely against it is Congress's way of getting around the sequester cuts to defense that the contractors and MIC have been complaining so much about.

Even a short term bombing spree is bound to cost billions of dollars, and would increase defense spending through a supplemental bill that would be outside of the budget deal.

The Military Industrial Complex gets its money, and Congress gets to thump their chests that they stuck to the sequester.

As is usually the case, everyone wins except us lowly tax payers.

Gotta love me some new wars.

Obama didn't draw the red line. Someone else made that happen.

http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/obama-i-didnt-set-red-line-syria_752712.html

In case Ted's link is different, here is the press conference in Sweden (I realize it is still morning in the US).

http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/obama-i-didnt-set-red-line-syria_752712.html

Embarrassing. I don't know how Obama supporters can continue enabling this incompetence.

I've never been a staunch Obie supporter, but I honestly never expected him to go full-on retard like this. It really is embarassing.

^^^

Jesus Titty-f*$&ing Christ, what the hell is he talking about? 98% of what? Calculus of what?

http://firstread.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/08/20/13379062-obama-draws-red-line-for-syria-on-chemical-and-biological-weapons?lite

"We have been very clear to the Assad regime, but also to other players on the ground, that a red line for us is we start seeing a whole bunch of chemical weapons moving around or being utilized," the president said. "That would change my calculus. That would change my equation." BHO 8/20/12

Obama's problem is he is trying to play politics with a lose-lose situation. He's struggling to deflect blame and come out of this looking good, as opposed to just rolling up your sleeves and being a leader. He only knows how to campaign, and this is not a situation where campaigning is effective.

What is comical about all this is the government is about to shutdown soon, and the even bigger cynic in me thinks this is a ploy to ensure he gets a Continuing Resolution to keep the government running.

I remember Bush playing chicken with the Iraq funding numerous times attaching stuff to those bills no one wanted knowing they had to pass because they were screaming about cutting and running and not funding the troops. No one wanted that on their political headstone that they left the troops in the field unfunded.

Red State is already gearing up that anyone who is willing to fund Syria but not defund Obamacare is going to be primaried out of office on that tagline.

This whole episode is a big kabuki dance that has to do with everything other than Syria.

Footwedge;1495157 wrote:Gotta love me some new wars.

Have you dipped into any of that stock of Orville Reddonbocker's finest popcorn yet?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l93XmB6_pxs

http://www.policymic.com/articles/24164/a-list-of-children-killed-by-drone-strikes-in-pakistan-and-yemen

Chemical weapons are appalling, though.

Probably a more pathetic scapegoat than weapons of mass destruction.

Well, to answer the OP, just by talking about attacking Syria, he's screwing up big-time.

IMO, around the top of Bush's Biggest Blunders (alliterative, too!) was the whole meaningless Iraq war thing manufactured under the flimsiest of excuses (since people could search for eons and not find legit connections between them and 9/11).

And now, you have the same sort of thing...except there's none of the "YEAH 'MURRCA! BLOW STUFF UP, WOO!" sentiment that 9/11 brought out in the populace as pertaining to the Middle East in general. Especially from what I remember on the old Huddle, where you were pretty much an un-American piece of shit if you weren't in favor of blowing up as much of the Middle East as humanly possible.

It's the sort of thing that makes one wonder if he's determined to leave office with a 0% approval rating. I mean, when he took office the first time, a big promise seemed to revolve around the whole "end Bush's wars; bring troops home" thing and instead of that, he's just looking for his own wars to send more soldiers to.

Heretic;1495893 wrote:...he's just looking for his own wars to send more soldiers to.

That's called a jobs program (in this case, one that actually works)

^^^

Be that as it may there was no doubt Iraq had chemical weapons and used them often, and not just on their own citizens (the Kurds) but against Iran. How can you be against intervention then, and for it now?

Manhattan Buckeye;1495905 wrote:^^^

Be that as it may there was no doubt Iraq had chemical weapons and used them often, and not just on their own citizens (the Kurds) but against Iran. How can you be against intervention then, and for it now?

Uh, I'm not?

I'm talking about Kerry and Obama, not you.

gut;1495901 wrote:That's called a jobs program (in this case, one that actually works)

Short-term economic stimulus for the win!

gut;1495901 wrote:That's called a jobs program (in this case, one that actually works)

Yes...putting people to work destroying lives and wealth is a jobs program that works but a jobs program that employs the otherwise unemployed to build socially useful public wealth in 'Merica doesn't actually work.

A war in Syria would be based on spurious reasoning at best. The norm against slaughter by gas is stupid when there is constant slaughter that no one cares about.

Maybe Obummer is pulling an FDR and ratcheting up the war drums that will generate the deficit spending needed to get us to full employment.

/Conspiracy Theory'd

Really just another bogus proxy based on faux moral outrage by the industrialized world.

BoatShoes;1495937 wrote:Yes...putting people to work destroying lives and wealth is a jobs program that works but a jobs program that employs the otherwise unemployed to build socially useful public wealth in 'Merica doesn't actually work.

Don't argue with me, argue with the empirical data.

I thought putting people to work liberating the oppressed would be a liberal's wet dream.

gut;1495940 wrote:Don't argue with me, argue with the empirical data.

I thought putting people to work liberating the oppressed would be a liberal's wet dream.

Lol what empirical data might you be referring to??? It's not a hard concept...despite the WPA being too small, the millions of public wealth created was a better thing than the massive horrific destruction of the world in WWII. Building tanks and planes makes us wealthier too but we subtract from that wealth when it's destroyed in war. It is obvious that social useful that is not destroyed and remains for generations is even better than socially useful output that is used to destroy and part of which is destroyed itself. I suppose you want to conscript the unemployed/offer all the unemployed a job for public works here at home like we've conscripted them for wars?? I'm on board

But, we're not really "liberating the oppressed" with these wars anyways. But, creating employment and maybe saving some lives that would otherwise be lost is better than nothing....but that's not really what's going to happen. If I was some kind of pure jingoist and thought the death and destruction of Syria was a justified means to the end of full employment maybe you'd be right. Massive and catstrophic unemployment is causing more harm to American citizens than anything going on in Syria and that is not a good enough call to action here at home. It's not an exaggeration to say that unemployment has been the proximate cause of more deaths and suicides of americans here in American than Sarin Gas has caused the death of Syrians in Syria. The people afflicted by massive life-destroying unemployment here in America are largely just as innocent and they are given lip service by Congress and the President.


and of course the last few foreign adventures in the name of justice for the oppressed have been largely quagmires with little justice for the oppressed to be found.

http://photoblog.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/09/04/20328454-on-instagram-business-as-usual-for-syrian-first-lady?lite

Assad's wife looks like she's 15 yrs old (which maybe she is as far as I know...) but I'd like to see what she looks like wwith a cruise missle up her pooter.

Tiernan;1496014 wrote:http://photoblog.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/09/04/20328454-on-instagram-business-as-usual-for-syrian-first-lady?lite

Assad's wife looks like she's 15 yrs old (which maybe she is as far as I know...) but I'd like to see what she looks like wwith a cruise missle up her pooter.

I actually remember the big uproar about her from a few years ago when Vogue did a big puff piece on her that the Syrian government apparently had a part in arranging. She was actually born and schooled in London of all places, so she should know better than to have gotten into bed with a dictator like that. She's in her late 30's, but definitely does look young in those instagram photos.

gut;1495901 wrote:That's called a jobs program (in this case, one that actually works)

Eh, not much more/less effectively than a social welfare program, unless I'm missing how you mean this.

In either scenario, these people are being paid by the hand of Uncle Sam, and I daresay, the two ways in which such a program continues to be paid for are hardly good for a long-term economy.

O-Trap;1496184 wrote:Eh, not much more/less effectively than a social welfare program, unless I'm missing how you mean this.

You take people out of the labor pool (which is why there is a real effect)....and then you pay people to make their tools....to blow shit up that people like...which enables people to profit from rebuilding what people want.

Yeah, it's short-term. It's not rocket science - "stimulus" is a keynesian bastardization of supply & demand.