I'll tell you. First off, if it wasn't for war we wouldn't have war movies. Think about it, guys like Schwartzenneger, Stallone, Wayne, and Reagan would never have had a chance.
Second off, it's the only way to obtain prime real estate for guys like McDonalds, Best Buy, and Texaco. The owners of that land aren't just going to GIVE it to us.
Third off, it preserves freedom. Since the early 1970's no one has observed and kept a close eye on American citizens than our virtual alphabet-soup of police organizations, which grows by the day. Perhaps if they were watching something other than us you and I would be able to visit the observation deck of the World Trade Center today?
Fourth, it's a cool way to experiment with the neat things we've come up with in our secret labs. And it's also a good way to get such great scientists like Shiro Ishiiand Reinhard Gehlento work in our "best interests".
So the next time you hear some crybaby saying "no" to war, you point these things out and set them straight. If that doesn't work then kick the shit out of them.
Absolutely Nothing!
Say it again........
The only thing even remotely as bad as war is waking up with a terrible hangover, remembering nothing about the night before, and discovering Don Rickles, naked, cuddled up against you.
I had that happen once, only it was Nancy Reagan.
Well, at least Nancy is marginally cuddlier than Hillary Clinton.
You obviously speak from experience--- so I'll take your word for it.
Duane:
Nancy Reagan says your just jealous of her because she's a Size 4.
And she has a better astrologer.
It appears you all have cuddled with the Mrs Reagan at one time or another--- how nice, I think.
One of America's greatest heroes passed away on Friday evening.
Legendary peace activist Philip Berrigan.
As he faced the end, with terminal illness, he dictated his last words:
WHEN I LAY DYING...of cancer
Philip Berrigan
I die in a community including my family, my beloved wife Elizabeth, three great Dominican nuns - Ardeth Platte, Carol Gilbert, and Jackie Hudson (emeritus) jailed in Western Colorado - Susan Crane, friends local, national and even international. They have always been a life-line to me. I die with the conviction, held since 1968 and Catonsville, that nuclear weapons are the scourge of the earth; to mine for them, manufacture them, deploy them, use them, is a curse against God, the human family, and the earth itself. We have already exploded such weapons in Japan in 1945 and the equivalent of them in Iraq in 1991, in Yugoslavia in 1999, and in Afghanistan in 2001. We left a legacy for other people of deadly radioactive isotopes - a prime counterinsurgency measure. For example, the people of Iraq, Yugoslavia, Afghanistan and Pakistan will be battling cancer, mostly from depleted uranium, for decades. In addition, our nuclear adventurism over 57 years has saturated the planet with nuclear garbage from testing, from explosions in high altitudes (four of these), from 103 nuclear power plants, from nuclear weapons factories that can't be cleaned up - and so on. Because of myopic leadership, of greed for possessions, a public chained to corporate media, there has been virtually no response to these realities...
---
At this point in dictation, Phil's lungs filled; he began to cough uncontrollably; he was tired. We had to stop - with promises to finish later. But later never came - another moment in an illness that depleted Phil so rapidly it was all we could do to keep pace with it... And then he couldn't talk at all. And then - gradually - he left us.
What did Phil intend to say? What is the message of his life? What message was he leaving us in his dying? Is it different for each of us, now that we are left to imagine how he would frame it?
--Liz McAlister