We’re just a few months into the new congress, and it’s becoming clear that the Democratic leadership doesn’t have the stomach for stopping the war in Iraq. This week the Senate failed to pass a pretty flimsy measure calling for a full 
withdrawal (on good news) by sometime in 2008 – not exactly good news for those shipping out to Iraq for a third or fourth tour of duty. There are many reasons for this continuing failure, but prominent among them is the Democratic leadership’s fear of appearing as though they don’t fully “support the troops.” For chrissake – how much effort does it take to knock that straw man over? Voting for funds to send soldiers into a bloody catastrophe is not “supporting the troops”; it’s killing and maiming the troops. If congress defunds this policy, the Pentagon will have plenty of money to get everyone home safe, of fucking course. And yet they remain unwilling to do what needs to be done… what they were elected to do.
What congress has been making a lot of noise about is the administration’s apparently politically motivated firing of a number of U.S. attorneys last year. At a time when Bush is sending badly wounded soldiers back into battle, some of whom cannot even wear body armor because of their injuries, Dems are expressing outrage over some wrongfully dismissed lawyers. Sure – the Bush White House is run out of its political office… so what’s new? How does that compete with the hell disaster of this war? Jeebus – this reminds me of the Watergate days. Richard Nixon presided over some of the most obscene abuses of law enforcement powers in U.S. history, namely the COINTELPRO program of domestic spying, political intimidation, and worse. That went virtually unchallenged. But when Nixon’s boys broke into Democratic party headquarters, that was a different kettle of fish entirely. The lesson is clear – ordinary people can be attacked with impunity, but not the powerful.
It is hard to overstate the magnitude of the crisis we have ignited in the middle east. Something like 2 million Iraqis have fled that country in fear for their lives; as many as 1 million now live as refugees in Syria, with up to 50,000 more crossing the border every month. Syria is not a wealthy nation like the United States or France – this influx is putting enormous pressure on that society. And yet the United States will only accept 7,000 Iraqi refugees this year, even though our unprovoked attack is the cause of this mass exodus. Even more appalling, our government will not accept anyone who has paid ransom to kidnappers because it considers such sums paid in desperation to be tantamount to supporting terrorism! Families driven out by terrorism (ignited by us) being accused of terrorism – an irony worthy of Joseph Heller.
So listen up, Dems. If Bush is the man with two brains (one named Cheney, one named Rove), best to concentrate more on the brain that’s killing people than the one that’s firing people. Get off your sorry asses and stop this ridiculous war now.
luv u,
jp
Ah, yes… there you are. Welcome. As you can see by the banner head (oh, say, can you see the banner head?), your belov’d “Notes from Sri Lanka” has been re-christened (or more properly speaking, re-agnosticized) “Hammer Mill Days” — just one component in our year-long rebranding project. Ahem… did I just say that? Can’t have been me. I must have been channeling our publicist from Loathsome Prick records — the one who keeps insisting that we re-brand ourselves as some kind of contemporary country or aging emo band (yuk!). Fucker put one of those Bluetooth antennae in my head while I was sleeping, so every once in a while I pop out with his latest PR drivel. 
A: Specifically, scratching my left earlobe. But more to the point, we’re changing the name of this blog to better serve you, our valued customers… or not, depending on who you trust. (Jesus, that’s annoying!) Actually, the truth is that we’ve gotten tired of explaining how Sri Lanka is not so much the place where we live (which, of course, it isn’t) as it was a clumsy attempt to make reference to our state of near-total obscurity as a band. Turns out a lot more of our readers/listeners know all about Sri Lanka than we gave them credit for. So we’ve settled on something more suitably obscure — an abandoned hammer mill in the middle of nowhere. That’s the ticket.
So anyway… there you have it. Big new name, same poor quality. Everything you expect out of your favorite Big Green blog… and more. We’ve even set up a