See this thread by Time For Change for more details...
The U.S. War Machine, Halliburton, and John McCain’s Utter Subservience to Power
"One of the most important new books around today is Eugene Jarecki’s “The American Way of War – Guided Missiles, Misguided Men and a Republic in Peril” (copyright October 2008). At least it is if you believe, as I do, that U.S. imperial overreach and militarism constitutes one of today’s gravest dangers to the American people and the people of the world..."
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=5011510&mesg_id=5011510http://www.democracynow.org/2008/10/20/eugene_jarecki_on_the_american_way"Election Day is two weeks away, and this year may see one of the highest voter turnouts in US history. But filmmaker and author Eugene Jarecki argues that while voting is essential, it is not enough. He writes, “Unless we see our vote as part of a commitment to involve ourselves consistently and unrelentingly in the political process, our vote is wasted. This is because the forces that have led us to this economic, military, and political precipice exert such awesome power over the mechanics of Washington that no single candidate or group of legislators, whatever their intentions, can possibly go up against them unless armed with an irrepressible public mandate.”
....AMY GOODMAN: Explain your example of the B-1 bomber.
EUGENE JARECKI: Perfect example. You know, the B-1 bomber has a piece of it made, a piece of the plane made, in every single US state. Now, why? I mean, that’s not an efficient way to make a product. So, it must be serving some end. And the end, it turns out, that it serves is that the B-1 bomber was designed by its makers according to a process called political engineering, fancy word for distributing the contracts and subcontracts to build a given weapons system to as many states, as many congressional districts as possible, not let’s make it as efficient as possible, but rather, let’s put it in as many districts as possible, so that if this thing ever comes up for review, everybody’s getting a piece of the action, everybody’s in on it. And as a result, when, you know, the questions arise—Do we need the B-1 bomber? Do we need to be spending this money?—there is a constituency built in in Congress that’s going to keep that thing going..."
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
