About the author: Daniel Regelbrugge is a US Army linguistics specialist, and combat veteran, that has served all over the world and at the Pentagon. He currently oversees a linguistics program for the US Army based in Europe.

A greeting in a tongue that is familiar to you.

“We do not want to hurt you. We just need a bit of information. Is there enough water here for you and your family? Do you have the medicine that you require?”

The conversation evolves from there and in an ideal world essential bits of truth are conveyed from one set of lips unto the other; in such ways compromise is found and peace is made, however fleetingly.

Language shapes our lives.

Do you suppose that you could translate the sentences above into another language that is not native to you? Do you suppose that you could do so with a gun pointed at your head while children are either laughing or weeping amid the dust and the wind at the outskirts of a village in which you know people are languishing for want of vital resources, or in excess of tired oppression?

Do you suppose that you could expand the conversation and level of discourse in a direction and conditional nuance that might beget much more than just a flaccid shake of the hand and absent nod of the head at parting?

With the din of endless talk for no purpose, and the cacophony of political banter swirling all around like dust devils, one must look to one’s self and one’s own spirit for some chance at actually building bridges between people; the likes of which might alleviate, rather than exacerbate tensions.

In an ideal world actions accomplish all that is necessary.

In an ideal world there is neither war, nor famine, nor ruin.

But this is far from an ideal world and so within the bordered parameters of our flawed dominions; our humanity- our folly (war), we must do everything we can to ensure that as few “non-combatant” lives are lost as possible.

The U.S. Government has conjured the past in order to salvage the future.

The U.S. Government has looked to the pages of history, and indeed, to the writings of T.E. Lawrence and British Policy 101 for some assistance in the forging of a future in Afghanistan.

Not in some slavish attempt at mimicking imperialism or control.

Rather, in the hopes of finally working with the people of the region in order to forge and ensure a future that allows for the freedom and human rights of all genders, and echelons of society.

Years ago, the concept of a “Hand” was alive and well, and a very real instrument of the British Government.

The fact that this concept has now been re-introduced into military and political jargon is not lost upon the viziers of history and that which comes and goes between the shades of all we render here.

The “Hand” is a chance at something better.

The “Hand” is a person who wants to know the ones who suffer, and are hurt.

The “Hand” wants to know how such people feel; what they need, what they believe… what they lack, and what sets them into motion; for better or for worse.

Endowed with language and cultural knowledge that has been so thoroughly and intensely administered… to say nothing of the commensurate “human” understanding that comes with such awareness, the “Hand” is intended to feel for nuance and for hope.

The “Hand” is that of a sculptor and a blind man all at once.

Sometimes it is in blindness that an artist comes to understand balance.

One could potentially spend an eternity feeling unknown walls before one comes to any semblance of not just sympathy… but of empathy for the ones divided by them.

Would that the world were not divided by lines on maps; nor by walls, nor gods.

Would that Babel had not fallen and that we moved our tongues and our feet in myriad directions in celebration of the one.

Reality and reason conspire against the builder of bridges between lands and between peoples; against the one.

I would give virtually anything to build such a bridge.

Would you?

You don’t win a war by leaving a country. You win a war by bringing stability to that country. As far as Iraq is concerned, the United States didn’t ‘win’ anything.

Combat operations in Iraq have ‘come to an end’. Despite the spin in the press, some of the remaining 50,000 troops in Iraq continue to carry out ‘counter-terrorism’ operations, which are no different from combat operations, meaning that combat operations haven’t technically come to and end. But that won’t stop the Obama Administration from claiming the war ‘over’ or even a ‘success’. In fact, given the media success of the departure of the last US combat brigade two weeks ago, there are rumours circulating that when the President addresses the nation regarding the ‘end of combat operations’, which will no doubt be spun as the ‘end of the war’, President George Bush will be in attendance.

Lost in all of this nonsense are crucial facts that millions of people seem to have forgotten:

1) One of the primary justifications for the 2003 invasion was the threat of weapons of mass destruction, which the Bush Administration claimed it had overwhelming evidence of. Not a single WMD was ever found in Iraq.

2) Despite comments in the media that the regime of Saddam Hussein was complicit in that attacks of 9/11, his regime had absolutely nothing to do with it, even though millions of Americans, to this very day, believe that it did.

3) ‘Al-Qaeda in Iraq,’ a term created to describe the emergence of foreign fighters in Iraq, did not exist until after the country was occupied. Its membership accounted for less than 7% of the insurgency.

4) The Pentagon made absolutely no effort from day one to keep any account of Iraqi casualties. Now the war is ‘over’, low end figures are being overwhelmingly sited. In truth, in excess of 600,000 Iraqis lost their lives during the invasion and subsequent occupation, though that figure is largely balked at by most.

5) Millions of Iraqis were displaced within Iraq or forced to flee to neighbouring countries during the war. Iraq’s infrastructure remains ruinous, and post-invasion statistics regarding everything from child mortality rates to the state of overall healthcare are abysmal.

6) The United States is responsible for multiple war crimes – including the assault on Fallujah during which an internationally banned ordinance was used on those within the city, the premeditated use of torture in detention facilities, and crimes committed by civilian military contractors.

The above is, of course, only the tip of the iceberg.

Violence continues to reign in Iraq, the government is fractured, sectarian divisions remain as prevalent as they always have, and the influx of foreign fighters, the majority of which are from Saudi Arabia, continues.

In all, the entire venture cost the American people over $800 billion dollars, more than the total cost of the Vietnam war adjusted for inflation. And that’s just Iraq. Afghanistan is another matter altogether – as is spending regarding the overall ‘War On Terror’.

So the ‘war’s over’. Fly the flag and revel in a completely engineered ‘victory’. It’s the only way the American people are going to be able to get that terrible taste out of their mouths.

I’m probably late on this, but what the hell…

What does it mean? Well, it’s what happens when light from the sun, which is a massive star that the earth orbits, comes in contact with droplets of moisture in the atmosphere at a low altitude angle. While that explains the phenomenon, it completely fails to explain the emotional reaction of the individual that shot the video. My guess – the wonders of Peyote.

You know you have a clusterfuck on your hands when…

“At a visit today with German parliament head Norbert Lammert, Afghan President Hamid Karzai called for yet another “new” Afghan War strategy, while insisting that the current strategy isn’t accomplishing its goals.”

Anything he can do to gain some form of warped legitimacy at this point given everything that’s happened, and is currently happening, politically in the country is to be expected.

Thankfully, the people that put him in power still trust him. Or do they…

“Renewed tension with Afghan President Hamid Karzai—this time over the ouster of a graft-fighting prosecutor—is adding to doubts within the Obama administration and the U.S. military about their ability to show progress fighting corruption and improving governance, ahead of a White House review of war strategy in December.”

And then there’s this lame attack on past British operations in Helmand by General Ben Freakley obviously aimed at taking heat off of the fact that US military efforts aren’t succeeding either…

“Disclosures by Lieutenant-General Benjamin Freakley, then the most senior US operational commander in southern and eastern Afghanistan, support the findings of an investigation by The Times earlier this year, which found that the British military had signed off on a plan for Helmand that was flawed from the start.

In an exclusive interview. General Freakley recalled that he had been scathing about the British effort in Helmand, which included an inability, in his view, to put sufficient pressure on the Taleban while also implementing reconstruction programmes to keep the insurgents on the back foot. When General Freakley felt that this was not happening, he became so annoyed that he flew to British headquarters in Lashkar Gah, the provincial capital, to make his point in person.”

Because as we know, General, COIN is working out so fantastically since the US took over.

All of that presented, another seven US soldiers were killed in Afghanistan over the weekend. In a series of attacks, FOB Chapman was attacked, and FOB Salerno near Khost was attacked by 28 suicide bombers early Saturday.

By the way – 28 suicide bombers attacking a single forward operating base = planned military operation, not terrorism. Lest we forget, Japanese pilots that flew their aircraft into US ships during the Second World War wasn’t termed “terrorists”.

From Jerry Lanson at Common Dreams…

“Once again, what we don’t know about the erosion of rights in this country can be as bad as what we do.

While Americans debate and litigate the Arizona law authorizing search and seizure of anyone police “reasonably suspect” to be an illegal immigrant, U.S. immigration officials on trains and buses up to 100 miles south of the Canadian border are confronting and sometimes strip-searching dark-skinned passengers whose only “crime” may be that they bought a public-transportation ticket to travel within the United States, The New York Times reports.

It’s part of what some consider the new and improved border patrols to protect “the homeland” from potential terrorists. No matter that the kind of people being stopped, The Times reports, include an 60-year-old Ecuadoran-born U.S. citizen who carries a passport while visiting her sister in the Midwest because she’s been stopped before and hassled without it. No matter that it includes a Taiwanese-born PhD student who, two days after delivering a paper at a Chicago conference, was taken from a train — one that had never crossed any borders — in Batavia, N.Y., strip-searched in a detention center and held, facing detention, because his visa had expired. No matter that a 21-year-old Long Island high school graduate was taken from the Lake Shore Limited in Rochester, N.Y., held for three weeks while her mother frantically tried to reach her and released at night at a rural Texas gas station.

These are not rumors. They are true stories, reported and told by The New York Times. They smack of overt racial profiling: How many blue-eyed Swedes and fair-skinned Russians do you think have been stopped on the trains and buses, whether they are gangsters, terrorists or simply PhD students? And they raise chilling reminders of World War II movies in which Nazi soldiers would walk down the aisles of trains looking for Jews.”

Here was are at the beginning. The question is – what will the end look like, and will the majority even recognize it when it comes?

And thanks for the cards, too.

This is the crowd Mr. Beck drew today in Washington. During his one hour speech he claimed that “America today begins to turn back to God” and “the timing of the “Restoring Honour” rally was coincidence but also divine providence“.

Should you be concerned at the turn out? Not at all. Some 2.5 million Americans watch his television program, making it the highest rated of its kind in the United States. Should you be worried what Mr. Beck says to those 2.5 million people? Yes, you should. To dismiss Beck as a crackpot is too easy. Were it that simple then the picture above would show 200 people in attendance, not thousands. It’s also important to remember that Sarah Palin spoke as well, adding what some view as ‘increased credibility’ to the event given that she was a Vice Presidential candidate and will most certainly make a bid for the 2012 Republican Presidential nomination.

Like it or not, today’s rally just may have made Glenn Beck the biggest political pundit in the United States.

People often lament the content on Fox News forgetting that as a media outlet they’re protected by the same Constitutional amendment as those building the ‘Ground Zero Mosque’. The First Amendment guarantees Freedom Of The Press, just as it does Freedom Of Religion.

The problem, of course, is that by way of that protection, the likes of Fox News have the ability to take advantage of the First Amendment to shamelessly push an entirely biased political agenda on the American public – who, it should be noted, watch Fox News more than any other news channel.

Freedom Of Religion offers the same protections – be it fundamentalist Christian Churches, the sort that promote burning the Qu’ran on 9/11, the protection of the Mormon church despite deliberate political interferences, such as in the case of the Proposition 8 vote in California, Jewish organizations that raise and funnel money to hardline Israeli groups, or Islamic organizations that raise money to help those in the Occupied Territories that could very well end up in the hands of Hamas.

The Constitution, and its amendments, are, in truth, rather threatening if you believe in a mythologized idea of the United States and not the actual foundation on which it was built. Many Americans labor under the misconception that the protections afforded by it are somehow sacred rights that apply only to ‘core Americans’, which raises the question – what is an American?

In 1907, 1,285,349 people entered the United States. The population of the country at the time was 87,008,000 people. That means that the population of the United States increased by roughly one-eightieth in a single year – which is, if you examine immigration statistics, incredible. But it was those immigrants, and those that came in the decades before them, that largely transformed the US into the nation that is it today.

During the Civil War, Irish immigrants, for example, were routinely conscripted as they disembarked in New York – meaning that before they even left the docks they had become soldiers in the Union Army. Those same immigrants, who had no home to fight for or defend in the United States, fought, and in many case gave their lives, to both preserve the Union and abolish slavery on the North American continent. Ironically, if you spend some time studying why many of them chose to join the army having just arrived in the US, the primary reasons were that they’d receive routine meals, warm clothes, and payment.

The ‘dream’ of the United States was, in truth, not a ‘dream’ at all, but rather ‘hard reality’. Those that arrived in places like New York between the 1850’s and the early 20th century faced prosecution, unemployment or extreme exploitation, squalid living conditions in which illness was rampant, and extreme poverty.

In 1890, Jacob Riis’s work “How The Other Half Lives” was published, a photo journalistic effort detailing the squalid living conditions in the slums of New York City. The work had such a resounding impact that it would lead to the implementation of what were known as ‘model tenements’. Riis, himself, was an immigrant, having arrived in New York in 1870 at the age of 21. The irony, of course, is that it would take an immigrant to expose the horrendous living conditions suffered by other immigrants in the nation’s largest center of commerce and trade, not to mention its most populace city.

The true ‘dream’ of America was never found in its possibility – that a man or women could make of themselves whatever they wished had they the motivation. The true ‘dream’ of the United States is, and always will be, the significance of the guaranteed protections of the civil liberties of its inhabitants, even when those guarantees were not afforded some of them. While the great stories in American history often focus on military and economic triumphs, the truly great American stories are those in which minorities have succeeded in ensuring that the protections guaranteed by the Constitution are applicable to all its people. That is the difference between the likes of Glen Beck and Reverend King. One represents a false perception of the nation, the other its true promise and the dream that a nation can exist on this earth in which all people, no matter their beliefs or race or sex, are afforded the same rights.

If the time is upon us that that reality has been lost, then everything that the United States claims it stands for isn’t worth the paper that its fundamental principles were written on. Americans, whether they know it or not, are the inheritors of one of the greatest gifts in modern history – their own Constitution – which was, at the time of its creation, perhaps one of the most important documents penned since the Magna Carta, with its amendments only solidifying its prominence.

As Abraham Lincoln put it in 1862 – “In great contests, each party claims to act in accordance with the will of God. Both may be, and one must be wrong. God cannot be for and against the same thing at the same time.”

That quote is not meant to referrence Lincoln’s religious observation, but rather to demonstrate something of extreme import regarding the Constitution itself – that Americans cannot be for and against it at the same time.

Something Americans tend to keep track of:

- what’s happening on The Hills.

Something Americans don’t tend to keep track of:

- the annual Defense budget.

The United States spends more per year on military expenditures than every other nation on the planet combined – even during one of the worst economic crises since the Great Depression.

This year the Defense Budget was: $663 billion dollars plus a $37 billion dollar supplemental for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan plus defense related expenditures outside of the DOD’s budget totalling some $360 billion dollars.

The total for 2010: roughly $1.06 trillion dollars. Put in perspective – Canada’s current national debt is somewhere in the neighbourhood of $540 billion dollars, and that’s the incurred national debt of an entire nation.

My reason for mention this?

Today, Admiral Michael Mullen, the head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, commented in Detroit that the single largest threat to US national security at the moment is the US national debt. His reason? Because the continuing degradation of the US economy hurts, more than anything else, US defense spending.

He was in Detroit in an bid to influence arms manufacturers to hire more veterans, claiming it “patriotic”.