What the fuck is there for us in Afghanistan except goats and the men who love them?
Indeed. Indeed.
-- Badtux the Snarky Penguin
1 day ago
Tuesday, December 01, 2009
6 comments:
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I don't understand what is there that we would want. Fence the frigging place off and let them work it out.
ReplyDeleteBut the American economy thrives on warmongering so there you go. You may as well support it being as in ways not seen to you it helps keep you employed.
And I don't get the sense that you want to live on less.
Wow, a substantive comment from BBC. Will wonders never cease ;).
ReplyDeleteAgree on the fence-the-place-off comment. Disagree on the warmongering being good for the economy bit. That's a common misperception. Every dollar spent on bullets and bombs is a dollar that generates $0 in actual value for the economy. Bullets and bombs have one purpose -- to be destroyed. It's like paying one group of men to dig holes, and another group of men to fill holes back in -- you have nothing of value at the end. Except in the case of bullets and bombs, you have *less* of value in the end -- the steel and lead that went into those bullets and bombs is no longer available to use for productive purposes.
In short, simply giving welfare checks to the munitions providers and their employees. would be better for our economy than the current situation, because then we'd still have that steel and lead available to use to make stuff that people actually want and/or need.
- Badtux the Economics Penguin
Once again you have shown intelligence and impeccable taste in your choice of quotes! ;)
ReplyDeleteyeesh. Who's looking for why?
ReplyDeleteMe and Pepe.
Welcome to Pipelineistan
"The bloodstream of the global energy war is the pipelines that crisscross the planet's potential imperial battlefields."
—By Pepe Escobar
And if it's not energy, let's look at mining interests, or perhaps Himalayan water---
Wow, Tata is a huge company.
Natural resources Afghanistan (CIA)
natural gas, petroleum, coal, copper, chromite, talc, barites, sulfur, lead, zinc, iron ore, salt, precious and semiprecious stones
Crude Steel statistics 2009
Nunya, there's a whole lot more of those resources closer to home where there's better infrastructure to exploit them (Afghanistan is damned hard to get to in case you haven't noticed), and the pipeline thing is more of a pipe dream than anything that will become reality anytime soon. There's just no there there, except the goats and the people who love them.
ReplyDelete- Badtux the Practical Penguin
If economic stimulus is what you're looking for, military spending is absolutely the least effective way to do it, even if you weren't paying for death, destruction, and mayhem.
ReplyDeleteWhich I now realize is almost, but not quite, exactly what BT said.
I need to go to bed.
Cheers!
JzB the over-tired trombonist.