simple solutions to problems

The whole thing is well worth reading, but here's an interesting tidbit:

Among the more important lessons George Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Karl Rove, and others learned from the Vietnam conflict, he writes, was that if you want to suppress domestic questioning of foreign military adventures, then eliminate the draft, create an all-volunteer force, reduce domestic taxes, and maintain a false prosperity based on foreign borrowing.

- Chalmers Johnson reviewing Stephen Holmes reviewing Geoffry Stone (that sounds confusing because it is)

Who ever said we learned nothing from Vietnam?

Here's the prescription to cure our ills:

There is, I believe, only one solution to the crisis we face. The American people must make the decision to dismantle both the empire that has been created in their name and the huge, still growing military establishment that undergirds it. It is a task at least comparable to that undertaken by the British government when, after World War II, it liquidated the British Empire. By doing so, Britain avoided the fate of the Roman Republic -- becoming a domestic tyranny and losing its democracy, as would have been required if it had continued to try to dominate much of the world by force.

- Chalmers Johnson

While we're wishing that the American people will dismantle their empire and military, we might as well wish for flying ponies for everyone. Shall we lament how much easier it is to suppress objections to destructive rampage than to avoid destructive rampage?

Is there anything worth saving anyway?