LibertarianChristians.com » iraq

Mission Accomplished, Obama-Style

Norman — Fri, 21 May 2010 21:34:26 +0000

On January 23, 2009 a two-day-inaugurated President Obama ordered his first murder of Iraqis with Predator drones. Now, exactly sixteen months past his inauguration, Barack Obama has failed to live up to one of the simplest measurable campaign promises I can imagine, a complete pullout of Iraq in sixteen months. We haven’t seen one brigade returned home without another taking its place, in fact nearly all aspects of the Federal Government’s Middle East interventions continue to increase in scope. I might have been a little more understanding if something had happened in the right direction, but pretty much all I can say that is positive is that we haven’t invaded Iran – yet. (Knock on wood.)

So yes, congratulations are in order…

Congratulations, President Obama, for proving yourself time and again that you are just Bush 2.0 (or is it 3.0).

Congratulations, conservative warmongers, for towing the party line and keeping this war going.

Congratulations, supposedly anti-war liberals, for believing the lie hook, line, and sinker, and supporting an immoral President through thick and thin.

Congratulations, establishment media, for continuing to shill for the State as thousands upon thousands of innocents suffer. Why should it take an independent media organization to expose what you should have been saying from the beginning?

Congratulations, Christian conservatives, for selling out to a political party where you don’t even get any positive influence in return, and using whatever influence you do have to promote continued murder. Seriously, you’re embarrassing. Stop it.

Okay enough with the sarcasm. You know who should get real congrats? Those who have been consistently anti-war since the beginning of the 21st century, no matter their political stripe. Those such as Lew Rockwell, Justin Raimondo, Laurence Vance, Ron Paul, heck even Cindy Sheehan have stayed true to consistent morality and opposed what is plainly an immoral, unjust, and unrighteous war.

Stay the course, friends. We must continue to oppose evil and call it by its name. Do not despair, for truth and justice prevail in the end.

(Hat tip to J.H. Huebert for the photo.)

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Mission Accomplished, Obama-Style

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Tags: Afghanistan, conservatism, ethics, iraq, morality, Obama, war, war on terror

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Podcast: The Unholy Desire of Christians to Legitimize Killing in War

Norman — Fri, 30 Apr 2010 15:34:26 +0000

After a major hiatus, the LCC Podcast is back! I am continuing the Audiobook series of Christianity and War by Laurence Vance, and today is officially the 14th installment, with the essay “The Unholy Desire of Christians to Legitimize Killing in War.” So much for getting started in the middle of January, eh? Oh well, life happens. Thanks for sticking with me through it all!

Right click here to download the entire audio file. [~21 minutes, mp3]

For those with podcast software, there is a special Podcast RSS Feed set up just for you.

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Podcast: The Unholy Desire of Christians to Legitimize Killing in War

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Tags: Bible, iraq, theology, war, war on terror

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WikiLeaks releases suppressed video from Iraq

Norman — Tue, 06 Apr 2010 19:37:24 +0000

Warning: The material you are about to witness is graphic – because it is war. If you’re still under the impression that the U.S. Federal Government’s wars in the Middle East are “protecting our freedoms,” then I hope this makes you think again.

To introduce the video, Xeni Jardin at BoingBoing has written: “No single piece of video has made me more ashamed to be supporting this stupid, morally bankrupt, endless war with my tax dollars. No wonder my government (and others) wants Wikileaks shut down.” Words cannot describe what I felt watching this video for the first time, so brace yourself.

Video: Collateral Murder (YouTube/sunshinepress). Also available as a torrent: (short) (full)

Admittedly, there is ambiguity at first regarding the weapons these people were carrying, but there is no question whatsoever about what happened after that. Without provocation, these soldiers fired upon and killed civilians twice in under fifteen minutes. In the end, there are no excuses for this.

What makes this incident so horrible?

So these men had weapons – so what? They made no aggressive moves, there were no indications they were preparing to do anything, and for supposed insurgents walking openly down a street they were rather relaxed. That’s some strange behavior for people supposedly about to attack you with small arms.
There was no firefight before the soldiers opened fire, contra the dialogue. But when you’re flying a helicopter touting 30mm guns, everything looks like a threat I guess? You just want to go out and shoot something…
And that’s exactly what is really sick next. They are just itching to open fire again on the crawling, wounded man (who is the Reuters driver by the way), just waiting for him to pick up a weapon to justify going off on him again. As if a man bleeding to death on the ground with a pistol poses any threat to a chopper.
What really, really made my jaw drop was what happened next, though. After first part of the battle, a van comes to assist the wounded. The van was unarmed. The people were unarmed. Oh, and there are two children in the van as well. Yet, more indiscriminate carnage is dealt to these innocents by these soldiers, devastating the van with the children inside and killing ever more precious human lives. Thank God that at least the children lived.
They laugh at the dead. Like it’s a blinking video game or something. Are they dead inside? Or just animals?
They justify their shooting of children by saying, “it’s their fault they brought them to the firing line.” Really? REALLY???
The children were initially taken to the military hospital for treatment, but were promptly sent to the other local, not nearly as good Iraqi care center – despite having been just shot up by 30mm rounds. How very kind of them.
But it gets worse, because after all this the government suppressed the entire thing. They covered it up and suppressed the data. Really, if their cause was so just, what did they have to hide? The efforts undertaken to push this under the rug should be a clear indictment of wrongdoing.

Brian Martinez at the Libertarian Standard wrote:

Perhaps someone can explain how we’re any more free now, because I’m having difficulty seeing it. In fact there’s no rational explanation for how these wars, or any wars, have ever helped us maintain our freedoms. We seem to be less free now than at any point in the past 200 years, and it’s not because radical Muslims hate our wealth and decadent culture. It’s because our rulers must continually find “enemies” to threaten us, from within and without, to maintain their authority.

This video is the tip of the iceberg. WikiLeaks and Reuters worked for years to get it into the open, can you imagine what else is out there waiting to be discovered? The only reason this video has been revealed is that certain people were important to Reuters. How many people have died and their stories been suppressed – people who have no advocates? Think about that for a minute.

War is hell, and brings out the worst in everyone. There is no honor in killing. Stop supporting mass murder.

More coverage:

BoingBoing: Part 1 and Part 2
LewRockwell.com
The Libertarian Standard
WikiLeaks
Collateral Murder

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WikiLeaks releases suppressed video from Iraq

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Tags: iraq, News, video, war, war on terror

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Ron Paul: Get out of Afghanistan NOW!

Norman — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 23:30:37 +0000

Some reminders from the honorable Ron Paul that we should not even be in Afghanistan. End the wars NOW!

Here’s clip #1:

Here’s clip #2:

The book Dr. Paul cites sounds really interesting, check out Barbara Tuchman’s The March of Folly at Amazon.

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Ron Paul: Get out of Afghanistan NOW!

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A Peace Prize for a War Hawk

Norman — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 14:50:45 +0000

In a extraordinary surprise move, the Nobel Peace Prize this year has been given to none other than Barack Obama as of this morning, for “his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples.” Thank goodness they didn’t wake him up in the middle of the night to give him the announcement. If you weren’t convinced that we are now living in bizarro world, check your planet again.

I think I may scream. Hold on a second…

…

Ok, I’m done now.

Fine, so Obama talked a little about peace and changing stuff during his campaign. He has upon occasion criticized the war in Iraq. Yet, since he took office, peace has grown ever more distant. There is no other verdict to draw from his actions other than we are under Bush Number 3. As I have noted in various ways here, here, and here, Obama has not come close to acting like a President interested in peace. I even predicted some of the things that he has done (or not done). In fact, his egregious actions against peace are so numerous at this point it hasn’t even been worth cataloguing in blog posts. Just watch the news for a while or read Antiwar.com. Seriously.

But really, REALLY, would you ever expect someone interested in peace to…

Not even supporting the rescinding of the Patriot Act (much less actually getting rid of it)
Not stopping illegal wire-tapping
Say you’re going to close Guantanamo Bay, but then move the prisoners to other secret prison locations?
Say you’re against torture, yet not stop the practice of it
Appoint ultimate war hawk Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State
Send 20,000 more troops to Afghanistan (with room for more), escalating a conflict that cannot end
Supports intervention in Darfur
Supporting bills that allow for the President to shut down the internet at his discretion for a “cyber-security emergency,” while at the same time criticizing Iran for censoring Twitter.
Escalating Federal spending on defense

The only thing Obama has done right for peace – and only thus far has he done it right – is to keep the United States out of Iran. And who knows, even that might come to a close sooner or later.

Perhaps this should not come as a surprise, however. The Nobel committee did give the Peace Prize last year to someone who likes to scare people into thinking they’re all going to die from the sun. At least the hawkish conservatives who believe that “war is peace” can be pleased that finally someone is getting recognized right – support war, get a Peace Prize.

We live in a bizarro world, folks, when you can get an Economics Prize for supporting the destruction of an economy (Paul Krugman), a Peace Prize for frightening people (Al Gore), and now a Peace Prize for supporting war (Obama). Of course, Hans Hermann Hoppe once said that to win a Nobel Peace Prize, one should be a mass murderer — or at least that helps. You’re well on your way, Barry…

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A Peace Prize for a War Hawk

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Tags: Afghanistan, iran, iraq, Obama, war, war on terror

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Podcast: The Christian Axis of Evil

Norman — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 03:57:49 +0000

It’s back! This is the twelfth installment of the Christianity and War Audiobook Podcast, presented by LibertarianChristians.com. Many apologies for how long it took to get this out, but as you know… life happens.

Nevertheless, today’s podcast is a doozy, for it rips a new one against those famous “Christians” who use their public prominence to shill for a warmongering State. The “Christian Axis of Evil” is the title of today’s essay, and it is also the name Vance gives to that group of warmongering Christians. May their influence be ever-diminishing!

Right click here to download the entire audio file. [~14 minutes, mp3]

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Podcast: The Christian Axis of Evil

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Tags: audiobook, bush, corruption, iran, iraq, theology, war, war on terror

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Podcast: The President’s Prayer

Norman — Sat, 22 Aug 2009 20:15:17 +0000

This is the *tenth* installment of the Christianity and War Audiobook Podcast, presented by LibertarianChristians.com. TEN podcasts may seem like a lot, but believe me, there’s plenty more Laurence Vance goodness to go. Remember, there are over seventy essays in the entire book, and so far I’ve recorded fourteen of them (not including the foreward and the introduction). You might think that this means I haven’t moved much through the book, but that wouldn’t be quite right. In fact, some of the essays in the first chapter are the longest in the book, and by page count I have recorded about 20% of the book thus far.

Today’s essay is entitled “The President’s Prayer.” It is worthy to note that in the original essay on LewRockwell.com, Vance posted a picture of a church sign (see the picture on the right) and referenced the caption in the essay. Since you obviously can’t hear the sign in the audio portion, I decided to add the words of the sign at an appropriate point: “We support our President.” It is rather important to know what it says while listening to the essay, so I felt it was a justified modification to the original text.

I think it is kind of funny that the picture Vance posted actually was created via Says-It.com and the “Church Sign Generator” there. There is no doubt in my mind that you could find church signs with this exact text all over the country (I know with all certainty I have seen them), so I guess he simply didn’t want to “name names” if you will… Anyway, enjoy the podcast!

Right click here to download the entire audio file. [~10 minutes, mp3]

For those with podcast software, there is a special Podcast RSS Feed set up just for you.

If you are using iTunes, click on the following button to subscribe directly:

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Podcast: The President’s Prayer

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Tags: Afghanistan, audiobook, bush, iran, iraq, theology, war, war on terror

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Podcast: The Wicked Bible and the Wicked War

Norman — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 15:00:49 +0000

This is the ninth installment of the Christianity and War Audiobook Podcast, presented by LibertarianChristians.com. Thanks for being patient over the last few weeks while I have been busily working on my research and on preparations for the Students for Liberty Texas Conference. I hope it has given you time to catch up on any podcasts you may have missed. The essays included in this podcast are “The Wicked Bible and the Wicked War” and “Is It or Isn’t It?” Both have to do with how we read the commandment “Thou shalt not kill.” Enjoy!

Right click here to download the entire audio file. [~12 minutes, mp3]

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Podcast: The Wicked Bible and the Wicked War

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Tags: bush, hebrew, iraq, theology, war, war on terror

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Podcast: The Warmonger’s Beatitudes and Humpty Dumpty Religion

Norman — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 12:00:01 +0000

This is the eighth installment of the Christianity and War Audiobook Podcast, presented by LibertarianChristians.com. Today I have two essays in store for you, including “The Warmonger’s Beatitudes” and “Humpty Dumpty Religion.” The first recasts the Beatitudes of Jesus in the book of Matthew for those inclined to violence, and the second addresses critics’ reactions to the Christian Warmonger Quiz (see the fifth C&W podcast). I hope you have enjoyed these podcasts as much as I have enjoyed making them!

Right click here to download the entire audio file. [~16 minutes, mp3]

For those with podcast software, there is a special Podcast RSS Feed set up just for you.

If you are using iTunes, click on the following button to subscribe directly:

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Podcast: The Warmonger’s Beatitudes and Humpty Dumpty Religion

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Change Never Seemed So Similar

Norman — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 17:57:14 +0000

Jon Stewart of The Daily Show roasts Obama on his policy “change” in Iraq. He even compares statements from Obama and Bush about the US role in Iraq side by side, and shows that – surprise, surprise – it’s just more of the same.

There is some bleeped-out language in the video, so if that bothers you then you have been warned…

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM – Th 11p / 10c

Mess O’Potamia – The Iraq War Is Over

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things With Demetri Martin

Political Humor
Joke of the Day

Change has never seemed so similar, eh? As I and others have said many times: meet the new boss, same as the old boss.

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Change Never Seemed So Similar

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Tags: humor, iraq, Obama, war, war on terror

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