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Dying vet’s ‘fuck you’ letter to George Bush & Dick Cheney needs to be read by every American

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To: George W. Bush and Dick Cheney
From: Tomas Young

I write this letter on the 10th anniversary of the Iraq War on behalf of my fellow Iraq War veterans. I write this letter on behalf of the 4,488 soldiers and Marines who died in Iraq. I write this letter on behalf of the hundreds of thousands of veterans who have been wounded and on behalf of those whose wounds, physical and psychological, have destroyed their lives. I am one of those gravely wounded. I was paralyzed in an insurgent ambush in 2004 in Sadr City. My life is coming to an end. I am living under hospice care.

I write this letter on behalf of husbands and wives who have lost spouses, on behalf of children who have lost a parent, on behalf of the fathers and mothers who have lost sons and daughters and on behalf of those who care for the many thousands of my fellow veterans who have brain injuries. I write this letter on behalf of those veterans whose trauma and self-revulsion for what they have witnessed, endured and done in Iraq have led to suicide and on behalf of the active-duty soldiers and Marines who commit, on average, a suicide a day. I write this letter on behalf of the some 1 million Iraqi dead and on behalf of the countless Iraqi wounded. I write this letter on behalf of us all—the human detritus your war has left behind, those who will spend their lives in unending pain and grief.

I write this letter, my last letter, to you, Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney. I write not because I think you grasp the terrible human and moral consequences of your lies, manipulation and thirst for wealth and power. I write this letter because, before my own death, I want to make it clear that I, and hundreds of thousands of my fellow veterans, along with millions of my fellow citizens, along with hundreds of millions more in Iraq and the Middle East, know fully who you are and what you have done. You may evade justice but in our eyes you are each guilty of egregious war crimes, of plunder and, finally, of murder, including the murder of thousands of young Americans—my fellow veterans—whose future you stole.

Your positions of authority, your millions of dollars of personal wealth, your public relations consultants, your privilege and your power cannot mask the hollowness of your character. You sent us to fight and die in Iraq after you, Mr. Cheney, dodged the draft in Vietnam, and you, Mr. Bush, went AWOL from your National Guard unit. Your cowardice and selfishness were established decades ago. You were not willing to risk yourselves for our nation but you sent hundreds of thousands of young men and women to be sacrificed in a senseless war with no more thought than it takes to put out the garbage.

I joined the Army two days after the 9/11 attacks. I joined the Army because our country had been attacked. I wanted to strike back at those who had killed some 3,000 of my fellow citizens. I did not join the Army to go to Iraq, a country that had no part in the September 2001 attacks and did not pose a threat to its neighbors, much less to the United States. I did not join the Army to “liberate” Iraqis or to shut down mythical weapons-of-mass-destruction facilities or to implant what you cynically called “democracy” in Baghdad and the Middle East. I did not join the Army to rebuild Iraq, which at the time you told us could be paid for by Iraq’s oil revenues. Instead, this war has cost the United States over $3 trillion. I especially did not join the Army to carry out pre-emptive war. Pre-emptive war is illegal under international law. And as a soldier in Iraq I was, I now know, abetting your idiocy and your crimes. The Iraq War is the largest strategic blunder in U.S. history. It obliterated the balance of power in the Middle East. It installed a corrupt and brutal pro-Iranian government in Baghdad, one cemented in power through the use of torture, death squads and terror. And it has left Iran as the dominant force in the region. On every level—moral, strategic, military and economic—Iraq was a failure. And it was you, Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney, who started this war. It is you who should pay the consequences.

I would not be writing this letter if I had been wounded fighting in Afghanistan against those forces that carried out the attacks of 9/11. Had I been wounded there I would still be miserable because of my physical deterioration and imminent death, but I would at least have the comfort of knowing that my injuries were a consequence of my own decision to defend the country I love. I would not have to lie in my bed, my body filled with painkillers, my life ebbing away, and deal with the fact that hundreds of thousands of human beings, including children, including myself, were sacrificed by you for little more than the greed of oil companies, for your alliance with the oil sheiks in Saudi Arabia, and your insane visions of empire.

I have, like many other disabled veterans, suffered from the inadequate and often inept care provided by the Veterans Administration. I have, like many other disabled veterans, come to realize that our mental and physical wounds are of no interest to you, perhaps of no interest to any politician. We were used. We were betrayed. And we have been abandoned. You, Mr. Bush, make much pretense of being a Christian. But isn’t lying a sin? Isn’t murder a sin? Aren’t theft and selfish ambition sins? I am not a Christian. But I believe in the Christian ideal. I believe that what you do to the least of your brothers you finally do to yourself, to your own soul.

My day of reckoning is upon me. Yours will come. I hope you will be put on trial. But mostly I hope, for your sakes, that you find the moral courage to face what you have done to me and to many, many others who deserved to live. I hope that before your time on earth ends, as mine is now ending, you will find the strength of character to stand before the American public and the world, and in particular the Iraqi people, and beg for forgiveness.

Tomas Young
 
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The Crucifixion of Tomas Young (TruthDig)

 

Posted by Richard Metzger
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03.19.2013
02:11 pm
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George Bush, the NUDE self-portrait!
02.08.2013
11:41 am
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When he left the White House, 43rd president George Bush took up painting. Yesterday, The Smoking Gun reported that Bush’s sister, Dorothy Bush, and some other family members and friends of his and his father’s, had seen their email accounts compromised. Several things, including hospital photos of George H. W. Bush, were stolen in the breach.

Also among the pilfered items the hacker, who goes by the handle “Guccifer” (nice name!) obtained, was this curious nude self-portrait of the former president in the shower.

Apparently Bush sends snaps of his works-in-progress to his sister, which makes this even weirder.

I must say, though, I’d buy this in a heartbeat. Conceptually speaking, it’s a masterpiece! Does Bush have a gallery that represents him? Get in touch!

Below, another, even sadder view into the existential horror of Bush’s existence:
 
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Via Salon

Posted by Richard Metzger
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02.08.2013
11:41 am
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Bring me the head of George W Bush: ‘Game of Thrones’ puts former POTUS on a spike
06.13.2012
07:47 pm
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In the commentary track on the tenth episode of the first season of HBO’s Game of Thrones DVD, David Benioff, co-creator of the show reveals an amusing secret about one of the severed heads seen on spikes: “The last head on the left is George Bush” and then his partner chimes in “George Bush’s head appears in a couple beheading scenes.”

“It’s not a choice, it’s not a political statement,” explained Benioff. “It’s just, we had to use what heads we had around.”

A likely story…

They’ve got the video at io9

 

Posted by Richard Metzger
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06.13.2012
07:47 pm
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How George Bush turned a projected $6 trillion surplus into $6 trillion of debt
04.06.2012
03:06 pm
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Quite a visual, ain’t it? The bit in blue? That’s what the Obama administration added to it.

If someone put that on a sign and walked around a Tea party rally with it, I’d imagine that it would cause people to become quite angry.

Click here for a larger version. 

Source: Treasury Dept./Via reddit/r/politics/

 

Posted by Richard Metzger
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04.06.2012
03:06 pm
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10-years ago today Bush declared disappearing budget surplus was ‘incredibly positive news’


 
Let’s elect another idiot cowboy from Texas President in 2012 and commit national suicide, shall we?

From The New York Times of August 24, 2001.

CRAWFORD, Tex., Aug. 24 — President Bush said today that there was a benefit to the government’s fast-dwindling surplus, declaring that it would create “a fiscal straitjacket for Congress.” He said that was “incredibly positive news” because it would halt the growth of the Federal government.

In a 45-minute news conference in a community hall next to a recreational-vehicle park here, Mr. Bush avoided giving specific answers to several questions about how he would find the money for his next big initiatives — from missile defense, to overhauling the military, to reforming Medicaid — without dipping into Social Security surpluses that both parties have declared off-limits. And he made it clear he would not re-think his tax cut, saying, “I can’t tell you how proud I am to be traveling around the country and people say, `Thanks for the $600.’ “

At the same time, Mr. Bush talked in some detail about the economic slowdown, which he called a “correction,” and left open the possibility that he might dip into the Social Security surplus if a further economic stimulus was needed.

“I’ve said that the only reason we should use Social Security funds is in the case of an economic recession or war,” Mr. Bush said.

Read the rest (and weep):
Bush Says Dwindling Surplus Will Halt Government Growth (New York Times archive)

Via Redditor Technicolor Motor Home

 

Posted by Richard Metzger
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08.25.2011
03:22 pm
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George Bush & Osama Bin Laden ‘super funny children’s toy’
04.01.2011
03:57 pm
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This is interesting, isn’t it? A child’s play set with George Bush as a tank commander chasing Osama Bin Laden around the desert on a train track?

Made in China, but seen for sale in Morocco. It appears like it was meant to read “Path Car,” but they spelled it wrong.

Says on the package that it’s a “super funny children’s toy.” Appropriate for “ages 3 and up.”

Thank you Adam Peters of Los Angeles, CA!

 

Posted by Richard Metzger
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04.01.2011
03:57 pm
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William Klein’s Mister Freedom
10.29.2009
01:04 am
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Mister Freedom is a 1969 satire directed by expat American fashion photographer William Klein. It stars French actress Delphne Seyrig (who was also in Day of the Jackal). Donald Pleasence and Serge Gainsbourg have supporting roles and May 1968 student rebel-rouser Daniel Cohn-Bendit, Simone Signoret and Yves Montand have uncredited cameos.
 
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Mister Freedom concerns a loutish, jingoistic American superhero, a self-righteous idiot run amok, who’s willing to destroy France in order to save it from the Ruskies and Chinamen. Obviously this is a parody of American foreign policy of the Vietnam era, but what’s so utterly uncanny about the film is how well it predicts the Bush era. It’s incredible! Watch a clip and see if you agree:
 

 

 
Beck made a “tribute” to Mister Freedom with his Sexx Laws video and the Japanese pop duo Pizzicato 5 made an homage to the film with their Sister Freedom Tapes EP.
 

Posted by Richard Metzger
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10.29.2009
01:04 am
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George & Bill: “The Bama Breeze Tour ‘10”

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Now that the whole Kanye-Gaga thing’s been derailed, I’ve got an open date on my “vulgar spectacle” calendar.  Maybe it’s just me, but when I first stumbled across these two grinning mugs, the closing lines of George Orwell’s Animal Farm came to mind: ?

Posted by Bradley Novicoff
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10.08.2009
03:43 am
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The Obama Whitehouse: Bush’s Third Term?
09.01.2009
06:43 pm
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In what reads like something out of High Castle-era Philip K. Dick, David Swanson describes what the American landscape might have looked like under a third Bush administration.  More warrantless spying, escalating military budgets, formalizing policies of preventive detention, Swanson’s list is long—and grim.  That’s just the set-up, though, to a far scarier punchline:

This dark fantasy of a third Bush term is also an accurate portrait of Obama’s first term to date.  In following Bush, Obama was given the opportunity either to restore the rule of law and the balance of powers or to firmly establish in place what were otherwise aberrant abuses of power.  Thus far, President Obama has, in all the areas mentioned above, chosen the latter course.  Everything described, from the continuation of crimes to the efforts to hide them away, from the corruption of corporate power to the assertion of the executive power to legislate, is Obama’s presidency in its first seven months.

David Swanson is the author, most recently, of Daybreak: Undoing the Imperial Presidency and Forming a More Perfect Union.

Spotted via The Nation: Bush’s Third Term?

Posted by Bradley Novicoff
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09.01.2009
06:43 pm
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The Glamorous Life Of Sachiko Hanai
08.24.2009
03:05 pm
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Pink” films, that brand of cutesy, cuddly, Japanese softcore, hold, for me, limited cinematic appeal.  But I do adore Mitsuru Meike‘s bravely outrageous, The Glamorous Life of Sachiko Hanai from 2003.  In it, the director of such fare as Bitter Sweet, and, of course, Lascivious Nurse Uniform Diary: Two or Three Times, While I’m Wet, injects the genre with a (needed?) dose of political commentary. 

Here’s the shorthand: out making the rounds one night, sexy tutor-slash-call girl Sachiko Hanai (played by the adorably game Emi Kuroda) winds up with a bullet in her brain.  She’s cool with that.  In fact, the bullet gives her a genius-level IQ.   She even—if I’m remembering things correctly here—starts quoting Nietzsche.  But the plot really kicks in when Sachiko learns she’s come into possession of George Bush’s severed finger.  His cloned severed finger.  Unlike what I’ve seen of Bush the man, though, his finger has an unstoppable sexual appetite.  Oh, and it’s also wanted by North Korea to trigger a nuclear holocaust.

What’s Meike saying with all this?  I couldn’t put my finger on it.  But here’s both a warning and a possible enticement: Bush’s finger winds up exactly where you think it will.  The (vaguely NSFW-ish) trailer for Sachiko Hanai follows below:

Posted by Bradley Novicoff
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08.24.2009
03:05 pm
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