The cops need to take lessons from the Post Office.

Kind of misleading in that they surveyed “555 respondents, each with investable assets of $1 million or more excluding real estate” to ask about Buffet’s proposal “to raise taxes on households earning more than $1 million”.

According to the article, only 236,883 households have income of $1mm + while according to http://money.cnn.com/2011/05/05/pf/millionaire_rise/index.htm 10,500,000 households have $1mm+ in assets.

Two different groups entirely.

Has the US gotten a single thing right in this trillion dollar mess?

If you understand the real racket/game that was played (and their real goals), the Iraq War was pretty freakin’ successful. Next up: Health Care.

#13 | Chris Mallory
They have already shown themselves to be Quislings and traitors to their own people.

Chris,
This is a poor way to look at the situation–and plays into the hands of the state as an “almighty team” to which you must swear fidelity. There is no singular Iraq “team”.

Let me put it another way. I respect what you do. I discuss your posts with my friends. I also have high standards for writing and reading comprehension, which I believe I have in common with your average Agitatortot at least, and probably your modal one. Regardless of the Humpty-Dumpty world we inhabit, words do have meanings. It is more clear to use “USG” than it is to use “we.” And a clear message is more well-received than an unclear or insulting one.

The reason for this is the knowledge that the individual has NO CONTROL over the actions of the government. When one of your readers is confronted with your word “we” in the context of responsibility for or control of a government action, it’s like a nutpunch. Don’t we get enough nutpunching already from the government?

Anyway, yeah, I already absolved you in the name of expedience, I get that you use shorthand. So, please don’t mind me … Use “we” to express your citizenship or interest in clarity. Or whatever. And I’ll keep insisting that you’re a better writer than that. Or whatever.

re the puppycide- the owners said they, ‘…now understand why this happened.’
so do most of us, too.

Yea but I was thinking the preferred answer in Washington would be permenant occupation of Iraq.

The assumption that the United States is the only country in the world in which it’s legal to photograph the police is comical, and more than a little ironic given that in this case, as in so many others in the U.S., the photographer was assaulted by police and then arrested on false charges.

Glad I could give you a laugh. Tell you what, when you’re writing about things the U.S. does as a country, you go ahead and use a clunky stand-in like “USG” to make sure the Internet can see your demonstration of your individualism. Or whatever.

I’ll continue to use the royal “we” because (a) I am a U.S. citizen, and (b) I think it’s goofy to make your writing less readable in order to make a political statement with pronouns.

I can see why this would be the most humane thing to do for people who helped us. But I’ve got to admit, it sets my teeth on edge to go wreck someone’s country, leaving a pile of dead bodies (in the hundreds of thousands) and rubble and a tottering government, and then to invite a whole lot of people from that country to come live here. If you wrecked my country that way, I’m afraid I might work up a bit of a dislike for your country, even if
I worked with you at some point.

http://news.yahoo.com/prosecutor-says-iraq-war-vet-killed-transients-thrill-230734492.html

“Ocampo served in the Marines from July 2006 to July 2010 and was deployed to Iraq in 2008.”

Some secondary reading:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_MKULTRA

Has the US gotten a single thing right in this trillion dollar mess?
All that money down the toilet, we didn’t even scam their friggin oil.
And those human ticking time bombs (PTSD soldiers) are just waiting to go off back at home…here comes another one now… duck and cover!

This is the level of intellect and compassion one usually finds in organized crime or large, corrupt police departments.

Correctly written, it should read: “Really? I didn’t agree with the United States’ (or USG’s, or US Corp’s) invasion of Iraq, but I can see how some Iraqis with pure motives might have wanted to help USG out. Depending on when they helped out, they were at the time either living under a murderous, authoritarian dictator, or “ratting out” the “al-Qaeda” terrorists who were blowing up their fellow citizens. USG’s treatment of them has been shameful. If they were promised visas, USG should give them visas.”

That’s a much more honest expression of those concepts, which still require further refining to more accurately reflect reality.

Again, I know Radley must use a certain shorthand to save the effort of restating positions ad infinitum, but I agree the line must be drawn at the “ambiguous we.” Conflating an individual with USG is laughably sophomoric and disgusting. And “USG” is one more letter than “we,” so it’s not really a question of extra effort, is it?