conflict analysis

(Kenny Holsten photo.)

Will the massive volume of leaked documents that WikiLeaks is now making available change the course of the Afghanistan War?  That depends on who you read.  The Wall Street Journal has the Obama administration on the defensive, while Washington Post headlines that change is unlikely.  From the WaPo article:

“New evidence that the war effort is plagued by unreliable Afghan and Pakistani partners seems unlikely to undermine fragile congressional support or force the Obama administration to shift strategy.”

In other words, what the voters think doesn’t matter anyway.

Deseret News reports that more Afghanistan War documents are in the pipeline.

Despite a Pentagon opinion that nothing in the documents threatened national security, WaPo says that both Dems and GOPs in Congress called on the military to plug the leak.  Christian Science Monitor describes a dual message: the documents are “old news” and therefore irrelevant, while at the same time releasing them was “irresponsible” because it is a violation of national security.

CSM said that the leak “generated more anger in Congress at WikiLeaks than at the war effort.” After all, we can’t have those pesky voters being too well informed!

(Amos Paul Kennedy Jr. image via Detritus .)

“If we were to take an honest look at America’s blasted landscape of “losers” and the far shinier, spiffier world of “winners,” we’d have to admit that it wasn’t signs of onrushing socialism or fascism that stood out, but of staggeringly self-aggrandizing greed and theft right in the here and now. We’d notice our public coffers being emptied to benefit major corporations and financial institutions working in close alliance with, and passing on remarkable sums of money to, the representatives of “the people.” We’d see, in a word, kleptocracy on a scale to dazzle. We would suddenly see an almost magical disappearing act being performed, largely without comment, right before our eyes.”

So writes William J. Astore for Truthout. Astore, a history teacher and retired USAF Lt. Colonel, argues that Socialism and Fascism are the red herrings of our current system of government– which, far from being a democracy, is all about transfer of wealth from us to corporations.

Perhaps this sounds familiar: I wrote something very similar a few weeks back. It’s encouraging to see that I’m not alone.  Once again: the Left-Right conflict that dominates the media is a sideshow.  The real game is keeping us busy while they loot the Treasury.

The real enemy is not “cookie cutter conservatives” or Obama-loving socialists.”  Its the small but powerful class of corporations and their executives who are grabbing it all while we focus on hating each other.