(but yeah there’s alot of messed up stuff with kids and various video games but this doesn’t seem to be about bad parenting, or maybe just simply being oblivious now…. go build a fort and shoot fellow kids with sling-shots imo.. now if you exscuse me it’s to late for me, i must return to WOW O_o’

But I find that nobody’s taking me to task for my unflattering description of the right wing. Consider that I’ve had to live with the American left and right for years. And, thus, have developed a special place in my heart for both. Next to a furnace.

Most of my fellow Americans, especially in these parts, are self-proclaimed liberals. So there’s no anti-left bias amongst them. Instead, they’re walking billboards for the blog Stuff White People Like, minus the irony and satire.

Not sure about what it’s like across the big pond, but over here liberals are just as exasperating, and bound to fits of illogic, as conservatives. And many are so smug as to be unbearable to talk to, and condescend towards anyone not “Leftier than thou.”

And before anyone takes that as a dig against other Americans, I should point out that this is a problem I find inherent in the human condition. No country is immune to idiocy. It’s just easier to point out in the loudest group of the bunch.

It’s that idiocy, in American politics, likes to spread itself all across the spectrum. Equal opportunity, as it were.

(If you’re wondering why I have more vitriol saved for liberals than conservatives, it’s because I’m [American]…

Well, that explains the bizarre idea of what constitutes ‘left wing’.

Since the other Joint Chiefs of Staff, and then-Secretary Rumsfeld were incompetent and utterly convinced that Iraq would not need a large occupation force to keep the peace, they ignored General Shinseki’s minority opinion. Though, many years later, they’ve discovered the hard way that he was right.

Considering they didn’t bring in enough troops to pacify the region until long after it was too late to paint a happy media picture, I’d say that they didn’t have the strategic sense to carry operations out well enough to satisfy the whims of politics.

And, yes, only when they got more troops in Iraq was there a turnaround in the rate of violence. Also, getting the help of Iraqi local militias to smoke out Al Qaeda militants (who, as it turned out, didn’t care how many Iraqis they killed, so long as they hit one or two Americans in the process, which convinced the locals to help) improved the situation.

And the fact that the instigators of the Iraq war couldn’t hide their avaricious intentions under the propaganda didn’t help. Great job making everyone hate our troops, Mr. Bush.

Now!

These protesters aren’t here to actually make a difference. Any difference. They just want attention. They’re assuming that any and all games automatically “hook” and “brainwash” kids, so they’re also operating on underlying assumptions that insult the very people they claim to protect (the children).

Which is a fault that any moral guardians are liable to find themselves guilty of.

This is also a bit of self-aggrandizement on their part, seeing as how they just want to make a “point” on Iraq but through a new angle–one that could get them more press because it’s more interesting.

Having to listen to idiocy from Democrats and Republicans on the issue of Iraq, and even on war in general, has generally soured my outlook on any and all discussion I happen to stumble upon regarding the matter.

The left-wing is more interested in posturing on a ground of moral superiority to look better than the people who don’t agree with them. And they’re less interested in actually doing things, or taking actions knowing that good will come of them, than they are interested in making a fuss and feeling good about themselves. Also, tossing around insults that diminish others’ intelligence as a form of intellectual bullying doesn’t help their case.

The right-wing is still deluded by a national myth of invincibility and feel-good posturing of another sort–patriotic, my-country-is-stronger-than-your-country, dick-waggling. The sort that does no good, and throws away the lives of the men and women brave enough to fight for their country and duty-bound to die for their choice. That, and the right-wing is motivated largely by greed. This is obvious to all observers, and wasn’t sure this needed mentioning.

(If you’re wondering why I have more vitriol saved for liberals than conservatives, it’s because I’m a moderate Democrat who’s sick of seeing his own party losing itself to elitism, posturing, and hypocrisy. But if you need me to vote Dem in the general election, you can likely count on my vote. If I don’t decide to abstain altogether.)

On the issue of the invincibility of the US military:

No conventional threat can, at this point, defeat the US military. However, the military will never defeat politics. Or bureaucracy. Oh, lordy, the bureaucracy.

So!

Considering I’ve probably offended all parties involved, with liberals calling me a fascist for not having a knee-jerk moral-superiority perspective on the issue of war, and conservatives calling me a hippy for not buying into the propaganda and being unwilling to abide by their avarice, I should probably close with something to brighten the mood.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nCImrmR63JE&feature=related

Have some Barenaked Ladies: If I Had A Million Dollars.

It’s rated teen, though.

Oh and a recruitment tool. Or a tool for recruitment, in other words a way of getting people recruited. I don’t understand, Erlam was right.

What AA did was educate me and increase the respect I have for the professionalism and exposure to danger the US army does exhibit.