Last week one of my Facebook friends posted an article by Al-Jazeera on Israel’s attempt to turn Jordan into the Palestinian homeland.

I was reading the article while sipping my coffee and enjoying labors of free speech when suddenly I was thrown back to Jack Ass Land when someone left an insanely ignorant and mis-guided message on my friend’s Facebook link about the Palestinians.

So, I responded with what an equally immature and crass comment, which I later deleted upon realizing my churlishness (thank you “Delete” button).

Over the years I’ve been able to systematically shut down most human emotion.  However, I’ve been unsuccessful in two areas: HBO’s The Wire (I still cry when I think about how they did D’Angelo) and Israel/Palestine.

And this is why… from Tablet:

A newly revealed tape of Netanyahu in 2001, being interviewed while he thinks the cameras are off, shows him in a radically different light. In it, Netanyahu dismisses American foreign policy as easy to maneuver, boasts of having derailed the Oslo accords with political trickery, and suggests that the only way to deal with the Palestinians is to “beat them up, not once but repeatedly, beat them up so it hurts so badly, until it’s unbearable”

I’m not a fan of Netanyahu.  I want peace, I think Obama wants peace… but I do not think Netanyahu wants peace.  I don’t trust him.  And now I’m feeling human emotion!

I’m going to go watch The Wire and cry for a moment.

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General McChrystal may not have been the most politically savvy person in the lot, but at least he had a sense of humor.

In the infamous Rolling Stones article that cost McChrystal his job, it was mentioned that some of his team referred to themselves as Team America…  Team America being the exhaustingly hilarious movie by South Park creators, Trey Parker and Matt Stone, that mocks everything from American imperialism to authoritarian dictators to Matt Damon.

The Team America in the movie Team America is a group of self-important white people who who bulldoze over everyone and everything (Eiffel Tower, the Pyramids) to “save” the world.

Today, Marc Ambinder posted a picture of the patches that McChrystal’s team had made up!

I’m jealous.

Here’s my favorite scene from Team America when UN Weapons Inspector, Hans Blix, visits Kim Jong Il.  Hans Blix is HILARIOUS.

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Obama has decided to drop the missile defense shield in Eastern Europe.

I didn’t follow this too closely, but I’m a little shocked that they are completely abandoning it.

That being said, it seems like it might be a good thing as no one seemed to actually like the idea (except for Bush).

Also, while I understand the role of the sole-superpower brings great responsibility, I’m not so sure that responsibility should extend to protecting every inch of the world.

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Names of the Dead -- September 2, 2009

One of the pieces I get in my blog reader (almost every day) is the New York Times’ Names of the Dead List.

Every time a US military servicemember dies in the Iraq or Afghanistan War, the Times runs a small piece listing their names, age, rank, hometown, and regiment.

Today’s paper listed the 799th, 800th, and 801st servicemembers to die in the War in Afghanistan.

I don’t learn anything I don’t already know by reading the List, but I do choose to read it because it reminds me that there are real people fighting in these wars.  To just read the political analyses, one would think that everything is done behind closed doors in air conditioned rooms in Washington and Kabul.

Afghanistan is a mess right now — July 2009 used to be the deadliest month of the entire war… but then August came around; just like how 2007 used to be the deadliest year… then it was 2008… and now it’s 2009 with 4 months to go.  And to top it off, they just held a most un-democratic election.

I only hope Obama can make some progress soon.  I do think the additional troops he’s sending will help — even if they’re too few, too late.

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Check out In the Graveyard of Empires by Seth G. Jones if you’re looking for a good outline of what went wrong in Afghanistan.  It just came out and is very up-to-date.  However, I highly recommend that you also check out Steve Coll’s Ghost Wars about US involvement in Afghanistan from 1979-2001.  To understand what’s going on now, just read what we did in the 1980′s to the Soviets.

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