THE PAUSE THAT DOES NOT REFRESH

Though saddened, I am not at all shocked by revelations that US soldiers recorded themselves urinating on alleged Taliban corpses in Afghanistan. American war promoters from Defense Secretary Panetta, to Secretary of State Clinton to Senator McCain are "shocked, shocked" that such a horrible event could have occurred. What they're really shocked about is that such common, inhuman behavior that occurs all the time in our criminal occupations of Middle East countries, was recorded, and that the video got out; just like the Bush Administration war promoters were shocked that the torture they condoned in Iraq was photographed and that those photos got out.

We train our brave, young soldiers to fear and hate the folks they are sent to occupy and when the occupied fight back and inflict casualties on them, the rules of war and the Geneva Conventions become the real casualties of our mis-guided and futile attempts to acquire empire in the land of endless oil.

The video is actually quite appropriate in that it is a metaphor for what we are doing all the time to all the hapless citizens of the unfortunate countries the bullies in Washington choose to invade. It also serves as a metaphor for what our leaders are doing to the impressionable youth who are sent to fight these mindless wars.

Bring them all home