Tag Archives: al-Qaeda

Worst president

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President George W. Bush and Mrs. Laura Bush w...

President George W. Bush and Mrs. Laura Bush welcome President-elect Barack Obama and Mrs. Michelle Obama to the White House Monday, Nov. 10, 2008, after the couple's South Portico arrival. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In my opinion, that honor belongs to George W. Bush, surpassing the previous holder of that dubious honor, James Buchanan. Hardly a day passes without someone on the web stating that Barack Obama is the worst president ever. Their posts are usually a laundry list of some of the false assertions made against the President. In other words, a pack of lies.

Those false assertions started me thinking about all the ways in which Bush contributed to the present sorry state of the US and the world. Let me count the ways:

  1. The housing bubble and the aftermath could have been decreased in magnitude and the severity of the aftereffects if Bush and Alan Greenspan had taken action sooner or at all. All homeowners or those who want to be are poorer because they did not act.
  2. The Global War on Terror could have ended at Tora Bora, Afghanistan in late 2001 if Bush had pursued bin Laden and al-Qaeda with greater vigor when most of them were surrounded. Instead al-Qaeda still exists, and their existence is used to justify all sorts of intrusions in our daily lives. Such as airport screenings, monitoring of electronic communication in all forms and unjustified wars in Iraq and elsewhere.
  3. The Bush tax cuts were designed to reward the 1% and at the same time make Grover Norquist‘s goal of a small government a reality. Ronald Reagan tried to accomplish this in the 1980s using the Heritage Foundation‘s blueprint, but he failed because he lacked the current GOP’s ruthlessness. Those of us who rely on the government safety net are going to find that it no longer exists.
  4. Bush used a record number of signing statements to enlarge the powers of the presidency at the expense of the other two branches of government. In 1776, we declared our independence of King George 3. In his reign, George W. Bush attempted to reinstate monarchy in the US.

Barack Obama has the unenviable task of fixing what Bush damaged or destroyed. His task reminds me of Sisyphus rolling a rock uphill during the day and watching it roll downhill at night, only to repeat the uphill push the next day. Barack’s task is even more difficult because he has the current GOP on the uphill side pushing against the rock to make the task even harder. Rather than criticizing Barack for his limited success, those of us who support him should be helping him by putting our shoulders to the rock and aiding in the uphill push. We can succeed if we join in his efforts.

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Drones

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Predator Drone

Image by Doctress Neutopia via Flickr

Drones are remotely-piloted airplanes that the US government uses for surveillance and attack outside the US. It is estimated that each drone requires approximately 300 people to service and control in flight while a plane with a pilot requires approximately 100 people. We are employing many more drones so that at present there is a shortage of trained personnel to operate and support them. (Aside: great employment opportunities there.)

At first, drones were used only to look for and kill the top leaders of al-Qaeda. As more drones became available, they were used further and further down the chain of command until now drones are used to identify and kill SUSPECTED enemy soldiers. That’s right suspected enemies, no way to determine from 1,000s of feet in altitude and operated from 1,000s of miles away. The expansion of the list of targets reminds me of Donald Rumsfeld after 9-11. He wanted to use airpower against Iraq because there were so few targets in Afghanistan.

Wars are won and lost on the ground, so-called boots on the ground by infantry men and women. Wars are not won at a distance either in the air or at sea. Indiscriminate killing, as the US is now engaged in around the world in the War on Terror, will create more future terrorists than our drones are capable of killing. Before we attack suspected enemies, we should at least give them the opportunity to explain who they are and what they are doing. Too many innocents are dieing from our mistakes.

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The Starfish and the Spider part 2

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English: Large red starfish Gomphia gomphia fr...

Image via Wikipedia

 

In part one of my post, the Starfish and the Spider, I wrote about how decentralized organizations, such as Occupy Wall Street and al-Qaeda, are superior to centralized organizations. I promised to write about how it is possible to defeat decentralized organizations and that is the subject of this post.

There are three parts to the strategy:

  1. Improve living conditions so that organization members are willing to change ideology; this takes time and patience.
  2. Give organization members property rights and property so that they have a stake in society. That is how the US finally defeated the Apache.
  3. Adopt a decentralized organizational structure yourself.

The authors of the book conclude that a mixed spider and starfish organization, a mixture of centralization and decentralization may be the best structure of them all. They emphasize that getting the balance correct is not easy and will probably require frequent adjustments as conditions change.

Please see The Starfish and the Spider | Geronimo

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The Starfish and the Spider

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Cover of "The Starfish and the Spider: Th...

Cover via Amazon

The Starfish and the Spider, The Unstoppable Power of Leaderless Organizations by Ori Brafman and Rod A. Beckstrom. A slender volume of 230 pages published in 2006 and the bearer of glad tidings for the Occupy Wall Street movement. The final paragraph of the book is as follows:

“Yes, decentralized organizations appear at first glance to be messy and chaotic. But when we begin to appreciate their full potential, what initially looked like entropy turns out to be one of the most powerful forces the world has seen.”

The authors divide organizations into two types, those that are centralized with a head directing a body like a spider and those that are decentralized with no head directing a body like a starfish. Cut a starfish into pieces and each piece will grow into a new individual; cut a spider’s head off and the spider will die. Why is this so important?

It is important because those who oppose Occupy Wall Street will look for a leader or a central group to capture or discredit as they did in Wikileaks. When there is no center, there is no easy way to combat the idea(s) that OWS is advancing. In the decentralized model, each attack on the idea makes it stronger by attracting more supporters. Thus we use the strength of the opposition to OWS against them. By the time the opponents of OWS figure it out, it will likely be too late for their side, the 1% and their supporters.

There is a downside to the good news though. Al-Qaeda also uses the decentralized model. In the words of the authors, bin Laden was a catalyst who sparked the movement and stepped back to let others form cells and act on their own. That is in contrast to Saddam Hussein who was the head of a centralized organization, a spider, where capturing or killing the head could lead to victory. There are ways to defeat a starfish, and I will leave that for a future post. I am optimistic that we will defeat al-Qaeda and I am optimistic that we will defeat the 1% before they are able to effectively counterattack.

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Dick Cheney

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Dust jacketIn My Time, A Personal and Political Memoir by Dick Cheney with Liz Cheney. Contrary to what Dick Cheney said, the contents of this book did not cause by head to spin. It did confirm what many of us already knew or suspected, George W. Bush intended to invade Iraq no matter what. He even intended to defy Congress if necessary and was prepared to be impeached over the issue if necessary. Evidence of WMD did not matter nor did logic or law. That’s how much Bush/Cheney respected the Constitution.

Syria with the assistance of North Korea tried secretly to build a nuclear reactor at al-Kibar in the Syrian desert. Israel, with Cheney’s support, wanted the US to destroy the reactor before it became operational, but Bush was opposed. Subsequently, Israel went ahead and bombed the unfinished reactor on their own. That was the second nuclear reactor destroyed by Israel with Iraq’s being the first.

Now we are faced with the possibility of a nuclear Iran and again the US is being urged by Saudi Arabia, Israel and others to destroy the Iranian reactor(s). If we do not, I fear that Israel will again act on their own, and the US will be blamed for the actions of Israel as our proxy. For a brief discussion of the consequences of attacking Iran, please see my prior post, If John McCain had won. Recently, Afghanistan indicated that it would support Pakistan in a war between Pakistan and the US. Consider the possibility of Iraq allied with Iran in a war between the US and Iran.

I was disappointed that Dick Cheney did not mention bin Laden and al-Qaeda at Tora Bora in Afghanistan when we and the Pakistanis had them surrounded in late 2001. I was hoping for his take on how and why bin Laden escaped with most of his supporters to continue fighting the US.

Please see Guilty! | Who shot the sheriff?

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