Not really.
It's depressing how bad things have to get before coffee and asphalt are recognized.
Let’s see…today’s headlines report that Schiavo passed away, U.S. soldier is convicted in death of Iraqi (how funny is that headline?), and Laura Bush has taken a trip to Afghanistan to speak to the women there about education or something like that.
The Schiavo ordeal has prompted a lot of people to plan ahead for the possible day when they or a loved one may become a vegetable as opposed to a human being and need someone to look after them.
After many discussions about Schiavo with various people last week, I found a small array of opinions on the actual case. Most of the people I talked to felt that the parents were suffering the most and that the husband should just give up his wife to the parents to take care of until she actually died. I was kinda surprised by this however, it’s the easiest way out and thus is not that surprising.
Being one of the “pull-the-tube- people”, I was all for pulling the tube. My own opinion was to focus on the victim, the patient, and not those around her. I think the worst thing her parents could’ve endured was having her lay there slobbering for another three or five years until she died. She was not going to recover, only deteriorate. Her quality of life, which was zero, was going to deteriorate.
U.S. soldier convicted in death of Iraqi. This case involves Capt. Rogelio "Roger" Maynulet, and his killing of a driver of a car Maynulet’s 1st Armored Division tank company was chasing. After shooting at the car, the wounded passenger fled and the wounded driver apparently could not. Maynulet said he put the final two bullets in the Iraqi to “ pull him out of his misery .”
The killing was taped by a U.S. drone surveillance aircraft.
War is hell. War is ugly. What is it good for? Hard to say whether or not it was indeed a mercy killing, or what I would’ve done in the same situation. What do you do if you hold the gun and someone is laying on the ground in front of you with most of their innards on the outside? Was the Iraqi in that bad of a condition? The division's medic looked at him and said “there’s nothing I can do.” This statement is what Maynulet claimed sparked his action.
The Schiavo case and Maynulet’s case are worlds apart. One is allowing a person to die with dignity with some calling it killing. The other is killing a man out of mercy after trying to kill him outright in an act of war. A war based on completely false intelligence.
False intelligence, heh heh.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Karen Hughes has been appointed spin doctor to the world by Bush. Laura Bush has traveled to Afghanistan, and Condi Rice is in Europe doing the “we all agree on the end goal, it’s the means we disagree about” tour.
It’s taken about 6 years for people to wake up and smell the Bush, and even still some are trying to put perfume on it. I really wonder about those people that voted for Bush on single issues, and how they justify the presidents actions with their single or personal issues. In other words, will they actually step outside of their world and take a look at the big picture, the global picture?
YEAH RIGHT!
Bush’s approval numbers are tanking again, which is part of the reason for the PR campaign. I also think that Chimpy is trying real hard to save face during his last days. Republicans holding all the power in goverment depend on it. Since they seem capable of fucking up everything they touch, the whole 'there's a problem we can fix it" approach just might continue to work. The only thing is, it appears people are recognizing that the problems are being created by the very people that claim they can fix them. Constantly yelling WMD's!, WMD's!, terrorists!, orange alert!, social security is broken!, world is safer without Saddam in power!, gay marriage!, is increasingly more transparent to those that seemed to miss this transparency the first few hundred times it was yelled.
It won't change the hardcore believers though, or 'wingnuts' as the popular term goes.
It’s almost comical watching him beat the Social Security drum, forging ahead with the plan regardless of what the response has been. His plan is muddy and unclear. His numbers do not add up. He puts the onus on Congress, the Senate, on anybody but him.
Strikingly familiar to the drum he beat, and continues to beat (although less loudly and not as often) regarding the Iraqi war. Stay the course, be steadfast and strong, keep repeating it often and loud.
History will not be kind to Bush no matter how many neocons, republicans, religious-righters, wingers, spin doctors, etcetera want to try and paint this goofass as some kind of leader and hero.
Iraq is a fuckup no matter how you paint it. Iraq has become that little mess our little cowboy got us into with no plan on how to get out. We have to clean this shit up, and do it right. That’s the only thing Bush can possibly pin his historical hopes on.
