A Review of Tonight We Bombed the U.S. Capitol: The Explosive Story of M19, America's First Female Terrorist Group

 

Tonight We Bombed the U.S. Capitol: The Explosive Story of M19, America's First Female Terrorist Group by William Rosenau
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I feel badly for what I'm about to write -- largely for the authors as I know how much time, labor, sweat, etc., is invested in writing a book, let alone a book like this. But I've got to be honest. I bought this book in early May 2020  & nearly 2 1/2 years later, having read, stopped, started again much later, stopped, repeat, repeat, I'm now just giving up in massive frustration. And you know, I'm guessing my reaction might not have been so bad if not for the marketing, or more precisely the misleading book title that set me up with massive excitement & lofty expectations only to make me feel -- consistently bored every fu**ing time I read just a paragraph -- that has to be among my top five disappointments ever. Which is saying a lot. It bored me endlessly, almost to the point of begging for physical torture so I could be released from the mental torture, experienced in the constant knowledge that I was experiencing the most UNDERwhelming book of my life! "Explosive Story?" God, I feel cheated. And I resent that. It was so NOT what the title states or promises. Explosive story? Possibly a play on words as some of these women were loosely attached (largely in a support role) to a few Black Panther/BLA bombers. Even then, that would be a lousy trick & not worth crap. But if that title is meant to be literal, that's false advertising if I've ever seen it.

 

Think about it. If we're sticking solely with nonfiction, in no specific order & off the top of my head, I can think of a number of books that both I & probably a number of others would describe as at least as explosive or exciting, if not more. And I'm aware this is subjective, but at the moment I don't have the time to address that. Nonetheless, some options include: 

• Cliff Stoll's The Cuckoo's Egg: Tracking a Spy Through the Maze of Computer Espionage
• Vincent Bugliosi's Helter Skelter
• (Possibly) The Rape of Nanking by Iris Change
• The infamous Anarchist Cookbook
• The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe
• Bernard Fall's Hell In A Very Small Place: The Siege of Dien Bien Phu
• God: The Most Unpleasant Character in All Fiction by Dan Barker
• (and by far the most exciting & explosive nonfiction I've ever read...)
• Ken Follett's On Wings of Eagles

There are so many more I could add but I see little point. Moving on, just sticking with the overall theme & era, there are/were so many groups within the US & globally -- some almost more fringe & unknown than M19 -- that there seems to be an endless supply of resources. But as most would expect, there's a plethora of resources on a number of the usual people or groups, which doesn't make them illegitimate to read about, but does cause the forever curious, like myself, to seek out info on more fringe, unknown, suppressed groups, people and topics, & as this is the only book I've yet come across on M19, I was very excited. One can only read so much increasingly redundant stuff on groups labeled "dissident, militant" & soon "domestic terrorists." Some include the SDS, Weather Underground, Black Panthers, German Red Army Faction (RAF) (which, like many, had ties to Carlos the Jackal, the most notorious terrorist, but one of whom I feel is correct to include despite not working his violence for personal political reasons -- many of his clients WERE), SLA, BLA, American Indian movement, Italy's Red Brigades, etc. But I've known there were others yet some seem to be lacking nearly any resources, info, etc., which is simply served to make me all the more eager to locate nearly any info for the really underground ones. And M19CO (related name) was one of those.

To generalize badly, the smallish group was largely comprised of Jewish college graduates or dropouts, nearly all from mid-to-upper class families, most of whom had gone to elite schools, whether Ivy League or more women-traditional like a Smith or Wellesley, many to most of whom were lesbians (neither here nor there -- just part of the overall description, as were the prep schools, etc., et al), who had caught the revolutionary buzz circulating among both thousands of students (typically of similar backgrounds) or historically oppressed minorities, many of which initially formed as both community defense groups (from the police, such as the Black Panthers) as well as groups that gave out free breakfast to children, set up free medical clinics, preached "black power" in some cases, etc. Some were radical in their speech & ideas while others  became quite dangerous, yet often as many were being literally destroyed by the FBI in Hoover's infamous program you all probably know about. M19 has been attributed with some of the more infamous bombings of the late '70s & early '80s, but even though I read a large section of the book, I can't name a single instance in which they either didn't have massive aid from their BLA friends or were themselves little more than watchers & getaway drivers while the men did the dirty work. I'm under the impression that changed with time, but I was so ticked off at what I viewed as false advertising due to the title, as well as being bored beyond description that I didn't even care anymore. Lesser known groups (& causes) that interested me were the various Puerto Rican "Freedom fighter"/"terrorist" groups fighting a war dating back to the beginning of the century. A war against the US government, trying to earn their freedom as a nation instead of what the people there had been forced to endure as an American trophy obtained via the Spanish-American War and later as a federal territory, though never a state. If you want to read some about some horrors long suppressed in American textbooks, look up info on Puerto Rico since 1900 & its relationship with the US government. (While not recommending any, some options might include Militant Puerto Ricans: Migrants, Armed Struggle & Political Prisoners or War Against All Puerto Ricans: Revolution and Terror in America's Colony.) Anyway, there were many such dissident group in the US at the time, one of the foremost of which was called the Young Lords. One of the least known, least publicized yet most violent ended up, I believe,  bombing more than 120 government & other important commercial locations/buildings than any other was FALN (Fuerzas Armadas de Liberación Nacional). Some of their more infamous bombings included Wall Street -- literally -- the Rockefeller Center, courthouses, theaters, New York Life & Metropolitan Life's NY headquarters, as well as attempts against government officials like Carter & Bush, etc. While little known to the public & aside from their leader, virtually unknown to the government, a group of them were captured in Illinois around 1980. So, you want government acknowledgment, let alone details? Do your best looking because basically the only thing the government has ever produced as available to the public and not classified is something I have in many formats, including the actual book produced by Congress. Many of these versions have different titles, but they are all literally the same. The book held in my hand right now is called Clemency For the FALN: A Flawed Decision? Otherwise formally known as a "Hearing Before the Committee on Government Reform, House of Representatives, One Hundred Sixth Congress, First Session September 21, 1999, Serial No. 106-44." And it's a copy of the most boring drivel, the actual Congressional hearing so important about this dangerous FALN, that its purpose was to crap all over Clinton for granting clemency to these men who had just spent close to 20 years in prison. Yep, that's it. Now, try to find info, docs, lit BY FALN. There are a couple of books about or including FALN. But it's hard. There's not much there by the group. Two German universities had a couple of documents awhile back. FALN is still around, though, unlike virtually all of these other groups. Leaving them all, like M19, in the dust. (M19's era lasted from the late '70s to slightly beyond 1985.)

Yes, I went on too long there but my point is I would prefer to read about any of these other groups rather than M19, or perhaps a different author/publisher might have made or would make a difference. Considering my interest in the subject, let me make clear just how much I do not recommend this book. I'd rather read Sartre's tome Being and Nothingness (and I love his fiction & drama), which has to be the most brain-addling & rather blasé book (or maybe I'd rather read about algorithms?) I've had yet. So, while everyone is different & some have liked this M19 book, I guess it's no surprise to me that it's rating on Goodreads is below a 3.5. Sorry, but never recommended by me.

View all my reviews

Old Geek Humor - "Top Secret Microsoft Code" (from Tek Thots vol. 2 issue 6, 1997)

 Back in 1996, I started an email newsletter I called Tek Thots. If you've ever seen my LinkedIn profile, you know I'm intrigued by and pursue many interests. At the time, I was working progressively longer hours at a growing tech company that would become the country's second largest Internet Service Provider behind only AOL. (AOL was technically a Commercial Online Service so I've often argued EarthLink was actually the largest ISP in the country, not AOL. But semantics, yes?)

I was also teaching at a couple of schools on the side (one a tenure track associate professor position). I taught an odd mix of classes ranging from Composition, Creative Writing and Twentieth Century British and American Literature to what evolved into web development, software development (and a rare class on computer hardware). I was also writing and publishing, traveling for business and pleasure, giving seminars with additional odd projects on the side that could become time and labor-intensive.

Still, I had many geek interests, in part stemming from my involvement in the computing world since the 1970s, my first home computer in 1982 (C64, of course), email, modems, my first programming classes, security, BBS's, protocols such the OSI model, TCP/IP stack, etc. Spending my time working in the biggest data center on the west coast thrilled me to no end, and I was working toward an engineering degree at UCLA. Of course I loved gaming, helping out newbies, research into still little known tech issues (anyone remember VRML?), tracking down "bad guys" with some others, typical geek humor, etc.

Tek Thots surprised me by turning out to be pretty influential. I published erratically, had no help and did everything myself, but met some great people from around the world. If you've read my short LinkedIn entry on it, I note it migrated to a greater emphasis on security, privacy, cryptography, info warfare, etc., and I was engaged with many professionals around the globe and people seemed to appreciate the (free) newsletter's growth. At one point I know Tek Thots had subscribers from over 50 countries, including the US, Belgium, New Zealand, Sweden, UK, Israel, Canada, Australia, Germany, Chile, Finland, Norway, UAE, Italy, South Korea, Denmark, Iceland, Poland, Switzerland, France, Netherlands, Singapore, Hong Kong, South Africa, Russia, Spain, Latvia, Thailand, Portugal, Mexico, Japan, Romania, India, Austria, Bermuda, Nicaragua, Brazil, Malaysia, Ireland, Czech Republic, Romania, Slovak Republic, Croatia, Greece, Cypress & Estonia. Moreover,  many were in education, government and military fields and the majority of US subscribers often had email domains ending with .edu, .gov, .mil and .arpa extensions. 

 

The purpose of this article actually is NOT supposed to be a full history of Tek Thots. Rather, I wanted to post a snippet of one of the issues as an introduction to my new project to put up an informal site where anyone can access the issues I still possess from between 1996-1999. I'm missing quite a few, but I still have over 15 and I think some are interesting because I made a lot of observations, predictions and forecasting and it's been interesting to see how accurate I turned out to be. Also I encouraged reader engagement, not all of which was glowing fan mail. Those who are honest will surely admit that techies are among the first to rip into each other if they think a person is wrong. They have no compuctions about proving that person stupid. Fortunately, I rarely had to deal with that, but I did receive many messages from people contesting some of my observations or assertions -- good naturedly -- and I'd often print a few (with their permission) and respond in the following issue. I came across one such a few weeks ago from the first year of the newsletter and I wondered whatever happened to the young lady who wrote me asking questions and offering a small challenge in response to some things I'd written in the previous issue. I knew nothing about her but decided to see if I could find her and to my surprise, she's on LinkedIn! I haven't contacted her because despite a positive relationship, that WAS in the previous century and who knows if she ever remembers this. My typical strategy is to tag a person and hope they see it, which I would do except since I haven't spoken to her, I don't know how she'd feel about me identifying her by name -- even via just a tag -- on this platform, but I'll worry about that another time.

So Finally! I'm finally at the place which this intended-short article was to be about. I apologize for the lengthy intro but I wanted to explain the purpose and context, especially since what I'm about to post was typical nerd humor in the 1980s and '90s, but as far as I know, may no longer be appreciated these days because it seems so many people have lost their sense of humor, a pity. But I have one more longish piece of information to provide, largely for those not familiar with the old hatred of Microsoft.

 

One of the frequent things found in engineering divisions (and elsewhere) back in those days was forms of humor ranging from pure geekfest to stuff that probably wouldn't pass the current PC barrier and that was true even for many female colleagues working in these environments. We made fun of a lot of famous people and companies and there were so many to trash. However, if you're old enough to remember those days, you should get this, and if you weren't around at the time, you should probably know this so as to have any needed context. The two tech companies that stood out for criticism with a little brutality were Apple and at #1, Microsoft. I'll skip Apple for now. Microsoft was hated by nearly everyone for nearly everything. In no particular order, they made horribly inferior products, and that was in manufacturing, because both by confirmation and strong assertions and beliefs, Microsoft never actually MADE anything! [This URL provides good and once common examples of the complaints people had about Microsoft: https://www.quora.com/What-made-Microsoft-deserve-the-moniker-of-Evil-Empire.] Apple may have put some stinkers out there but they were innovators. Microsoft was known for stealing most of their offerings from other companies, or buying companies solely for a product they wanted to sell but couldn't/wouldn't make themselves. While Gates did create DOS for IBM (though even that concept is challenged), legend has it Gates, et al, toured the incredibly innovative Xerox PARC where they'd already invented most anything worth a damn (a GUI display, a mouse [originally wooden], Ethernet, laser printing, a great text editor, the alleged first actual personal computer, user friendly programming languages and much more). Many young tech stars famously went to Palo Alto to tour the lab, yet many sources assert Gates stole his idea for a GUI OS interface, a mouse and more while there. (Steve Jobs and Apple were accused of the same thing and it seems very likely they both were guilty.) Additionally, Gates bought SQL from a small company and has made massive profits, as well as Windows servers and their IE browser from a small company they (metaphorically) roughed up. Nothing original, yet even then, products that were largely crap in quality. Unfortunately, users had no recourse because for one thing, Apples cost so much more, UNIX wasn't a viable reality, and you couldn't buy a PC without the new Windows on it, so Microsoft had a monopoly (which they abused) that was considered so "evil" that the DOJ went after them and forced a massive fine on them for various anti-competitive crimes.

 To cut to the chase, though, the real problem was Bill Gates. He was simply an asshole. By then Microsoft was called "the evil empire" by many and Boardwatch Magazine published an issue so infamous that they had merch made up and I still have the shirt that features Bill's head with some sci fi contraption over one eye and the title "BillGatus of Borg," which basically went viral. I not only still have the shirt, but the poster too.

One known example is when AOL was under the impression they were going to have a partnership with Microsoft. On the assigned day for talks, Gates and his team apparently walked into AOL's conference room, Gates sat down, looked at Steve Case and said "I can either buy you today or destroy you today, your choice." (Recollected quote from book I read some years ago, so not likely ver batam.) Unlike most companies, Case threw the Microsoft group out of the building. So It wasn't until Bill retired, got married and tried to resurrect his image with numerous interviews and much philanthropy, and also other Borgs arising, that Gates was finally able to become ... not nearly as toxic to many Microsoft haters. [As a personal aside - having nothing to do with the many hundreds of friends, colleagues and connections I have there - I've been impressed with the fact that over the past decade or so, Microsoft has done two things they never did -- innovate and vastly improve most products so that now before the 3rd version of whatever it is, it's long been stable and usable. So kudos to them!]

So I have gone on far too long and I'm finally going to get to the original reason for this article. I'm posting an example (bad, fuzzy -- sorry) of some subtle (not really), funny, sarcastic nerd humor from Tek Thots vol. 2, issue 6, published on June 13, 1997. This was typical of many different goofy things we'd exchange and occasionally post in between pieces of hacking and hackers (Mitnik), viruses, espionage, human trafficking, Russia's illegal purchase of SGIs, geopolitical armaments, etc. Between the jokes and the computer game reviews, had to keep things a bit lighter at times. One last note on this issue. I called this issue my "Spamford Wallace" issue. Long story, but I gave out his physical address and some 400 domains, IPs, invoices, etc., when it appeared most have difficulty locating him. In any event, here finally is the code. I can't improve on it so I hope it's readable and if so, I hope you enjoy. For my friends at Microsoft, please realize this is a harmless joke from over 25 years ago, so hopefully we can all have a chuckle without any ill feelings. Thanks!

Yeats’ “Leda and the Swan” By Catherine Ford Greek Myth -Zeus disguised as swan rapes Leda -Gives birth to Clytemnestra, Helen of Troy, Castor and Polydeuces. - ppt download

Yeats’ “Leda and the Swan” By Catherine Ford Greek Myth -Zeus disguised as swan rapes Leda -Gives birth to Clytemnestra, Helen of Troy, Castor and Polydeuces. - ppt download: Greek Myth -Zeus disguised as swan rapes Leda -Gives birth to Clytemnestra, Helen of Troy, Castor and Polydeuces -Clytemnestra and Agamemnon

[Just trying to access this presentation to see what it says, what its thesis is. I can't do so without sharing it to my blog or something like that, so I can't yet endorse it as I haven't yet seen it. FYI...]

A Catch-up Catch-all

Hello! It's been far, far too long so many apologies to the few of you who know of the existence of this blog. Circumstances have made it difficult for me to post more consistently as I had originally planned. Sadly, I don't even have that much time right now at that, so I'm going to bail in a way, but ideally it will still be interesting or entertaining to you. I've been looking for a number of old boxes containing various things from my career as a writer -- contributor copies, letters, contracts, books, stuff from agents, my OWN books, etc. These appeared to have been long gone probably due to too many moves around the country. Shit happens, you know? Still, it's been a real source of frustration, so I've spent the last few months finding and digging through some old boxes in the basement and I've been lucky enough to uncover some things at least.  I've been working on building out my main site, which I devoted nearly entirely to my writing career, but that's a long term project. In the meantime, I've run across a ton of things that are cool, weird, funny, forgettable and everything in between. I've taken a long of pics, made screenshots and I'm just going to post some arbitrary ones here, though a bit diverse in what they are. I hope at least some of them will be cool to you. Cheers!

Well, the first pic, which is perfectly find on my computers, won't display on this post and I don't have the time to write descriptions about these like I hoped to, so I'm just going to try to upload some arbitrary pics and hope it works out and that they'll be largely self evident. Sorry, but thanks.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Let’s Go (Way) Beyond Douthat’s “Decadent Society” to Address America’s Rot…

 

Let’s Go (Way) Beyond Douthat’s “Decadent Society” to Address America’s Rot…

 

Stimulated/inspired by Ross Douthat’s The Decadent Society: How We Became the Victims of Our Own Success

WARNING: GRAPHIC, POSSIBLY DISTURBING, PHOTOS IN ARTICLE. DO NOT READ OR VIEW IF POSSIBLY TRIGGERED OR FOR ANY OTHER SIMILAR REASON FOR CONCERN. THE AUTHOR IS NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY REACTION TO WAR OR RELATED PHOTOS, ETC.

WARNING: GRAPHIC LANGUAGE, SUBJECT MATTER, ETC., SOME MAY FIND OFFENSIVE. READ WITH SUCH KNOWLEDGE PROVIDED BEFOREHAND IN THIS SECTION.

Book. Subject. Topic. Very good, I agree with many points ... only ... I would take it one or five steps further. Douthat doesn't go far enough in taking Americans to task and that's a shame because while Americans don't like to hear it and while Americans are too sissified to handle any bad news as they bury their heads in the sand, the facts are we are soft and weak, people are lazy and entitled, dumber each generation (and various conspiracy theorists have plenty of reasons dating back from generations to centuries of intent on the part of US leaders shadow leaders). Americans have lost all critical thinking and reasoning skills -- skills most desired by major employers now but a reason they're having to recruit from international universities instead of taking the "teach for the test” Americans, very few of whom are prepared for shit upon graduation. Everyone gets a blue ribbon for participating, kids are bullied, which while I admit has taken on a more serious and despicable tone, EVERY damn generation of kids in history has been bullied, my wife and I among them. Did we freak out, commit suicide? Shit! It's called Grow A Pair or Grow a Spine and deal because it's great training for what you'll find in life and in the workforce later in life, where the younger generations can't take criticisms of virtually any type. I was brought in to fire those types. We expect comfort and leisure, but I'm not sure why because unless you're one of the 10 or 20% at the top, those are basically gone for good. And here's the thing that really gets me. Americans think we're so badass. For decades the "ugly American" has tortured the world with demands, with bragging about how if it weren't for the good ole US of A saving your lousy pansy asses in TWO world wars in the last hundred years, you'd all be speaking German. There are so many reasons for people to resent Americans just for that because not only is it arrogant and snobby, but it's literally dead wrong. WW 1 was largely over -- a huge trench warfare stalemate which had essentially been for over a year while the Europeans in charge tried to broker a peace. Then, depending on which historian or conspiracy theorist or whoever you listen to, President Wilson decided he wanted in on the act -- and there are lots of reasons and plenty of resources, so he sends a million men over there about the time the rest were going to give up and go home, resulting in extending the war over a year and casualties by an ungodly amount. And after that, American historians and politicians like to try to hide the fact that he sent American troops to the Soviet Union to HELP them, such as guard the Chinese border, camp out in Siberia and built the Trans-Siberian railway for them, and US bankers sent craploads of money over there and all of this was hushed up, but the point is, the US not only didn't "win" WW 1 and save Europe, but we made it much worse.

But what about WW 2? We won that, right? Well, we like to tell the world that. And it's total bullshit. Some basic facts -- and not John Wayne movies -- can point out some basic truths. When did the war start? Yes, late summer 1939 when Germany AND the Soviets invaded Poland. And when did America enter the war? Yes, years later after most of Europe west of Berlin and much of northern Africa had been decimated and the Brits were the only ones keeping the entire region hanging together and they were about to go under, but by then, it had been years. So we "entered the war" with great fanfare, only it was with the Japanese due to Pearl Harbor, but somehow everyone declared new war on each other in Europe. But did we go to Europe? No! We went to Africa to help out the Brits, which we did. And then eventually from there, we made our way up into the toe of Italy where we faced Mussolini's non-existent armies, non-existent tanks, non-existent air force, non-existent weapons and the Italians all of a sudden decided they'd have enough of the fascist and they wanted out, which annoyed the hell out of Hitler cause then he had to divert a couple of divisions down to Italy to hold off the Yanks and the Brits. Which they did. Pretty effectively. So D-Day, right? We kicked ass on D-Day and saved Europe, right? Well, maybe, but when was D-Day? June 6, 1944. But did you know that Allied planners had originally been planning for such an invasion for one year earlier? Secretly? And do you know what cynical critics say is the reason why that didn't happen and in fact it took an entire extra year before “the weather was good enough” for us to get there? (Please don't misunderstand. I lost family members on the beaches there and throughout Normandie. I'm not anti-American. I'm anti-STUPID American!) Well, Hitler bit off more than he could chew when he foolishly invaded the Soviet Union and he had to divert not only nearly all of his armies to the eastern front, but recruit others from Finland and other neighboring countries to join AND also insist that Romania send its army (along with the inept Italians) into southern Russia, etc. And they were slaughtering each other, which accomplished two things for the western allies. One, we knew a beach landing and invasion under heavy fire would result in horrible causalities but the longer the Germans were occupied with Russia, the fewer there would be to deal with because they were getting killed by the bushels, so facing old men and children seemed much more appealing to us. Second and more important, we never WANTED to be allied with Stalin -- he was Hitler's ally at the start of the war and invaded Poland along with Germany. They were allies until Hitler double-crossed Stalin. Many American and British government and military leaders already viewed the Soviet Union as our next big -- and likely much worse than Hitler -- enemy, so while we were rooting for the Reds to kills off the Germans, we were thrilled that the Germans were doing the same to the Soviets. It was fucking ugly. Oh yeah, as far as D-Day (“Operation Overlord”) goes, the casualties WERE horrible, but the US was far from the only ones taking them with the invasion. If you don’t know this you need to. There were five beaches designated to be invaded, all given “code” names which were Utah, Juno, Gold, Omaha and Sword. Of these five beaches, the US was given Utah where the 23,000 man 4^th Infantry Division took roughly 200 casualties. Omaha was supposed to be the worst and it was also given to the Americans. The US 1^st and 29^th Infantry Divisions faced off against one of the few remaining badass German Divisions and casualties were predictably high – about 2,000. However, the British were assigned Gold Beach and with a Canadian division faced virtually no opposition compared to Gold and moved pretty far inland. An aside. How many of you knew that not only were the Canadians involved, but a damn whole lot of them at that? Having lived several years in Canada, even while a young lad, I learned about that. Because while the US was responsible for two of the five beaches (intentionally and erroneously often telling our students we were virtually the sole invaders and took virtually all of the horrific casualties, which is simply not true and yet so typical of American propaganda), the Canadians – with far fewer forces at their disposal – not only participated on assaulting Gold Beach with the British, but they were responsible also for Juno Beach! And I don’t know the figures off the top of my head and don’t have the time to look them up, but Juno was fucking BRUTAL and the Canadians took it in the ass really, really hard and were lucky just to get on to and hold the beach by the end of the night. Sword Beach, the fifth one, was the responsibility of the British and not only was it brutal, but some might argue it was the one that was least successful, in the sense that the invaders did not meet their objectives and barely held off a ferocious German counterattack. All that said, the invasions never suffered the terrible casualties so many planners were worried about, with estimates basically looking like of the 155,000+ Allied forces on Day One, “only” 4,000 were KIAs (as well as additional wounded and missing). While it’s tragic to lose anyone in war, war is hell as they say and sustaining “only” 0.026% casualties compared to both planned estimates and what could have been was very nearly a miracle. Finally, as an FYI, there weren’t only US, British and Canadian troops involved. The Free French and the Poles insisted and were given serious responsibilities in the invasion as well, as such was deserved. So again, not to sound like an anti-American blasphemer, but the propaganda that bragging Americans love to spout about how bad ass we are and were and how we took horrible casualties on D-Day while saving Europe, the Jews and the world is kind of bullshit as we were responsible for only 40% (2 of 5) of the beaches, half of which were nearly devoid of opposition and casualties. In essence, we played at best a role slightly larger than the Brits or the Canadians, but actually less than the two combined. Still wanna brag?

Another major WW 2 point and I'll move on. Ever look at the WW 2 casualty figures? America had about 450,000 casualties -- which is horrible. But still among the fewest of any of the majors in the war. Without having the time to look up the actual figures, the Brits lost a few more, I think the Italians lost over a million, the French lost about a million, shitloads of Poles died obviously, Romania lost a damn million (and you never hear about that!), Germany lost 7 million, tons of other countries lost more than their fair share -- it was horrible -- but do you know how many soldiers and civilians the Soviet Union lost in WW 2? Nearly every conservative estimate places the number at a minimum of 27 MILLION people! I don't know the facts off the top of my head, but I'd wager that's more than all of the Allied countries combined. And it was brutal too. Those on the Soviet western front got to experience what most of Poland did and they're still discovering hidden mass graves where people (especially Jews, but others too) were lined up and murdered relentlessly. When Americans brag about "winning" WW2 and saving Europe and the world, please remember we did NOTHING of the sort while we continue to brag endlessly and insult countless people who had to live through hell no continental American ever had to worry about. The damn Soviets won and with very serious blood paid at that.

Now I've gone on too long and it's late, so a quick example or two. One, there are experts at the graduate National Defense University and elsewhere who have written books (Donald Stoker is one) on the subject that most people don't want to bring up, if they even know about it. With all of our money, our tech, our training, etc., how come the US does such a shitty job at warfare??? Over half of our national budget and we get our asses kicked by seeming-prehistoric people who wipe their asses with their hands? And now we want to take on both Russia and China when we haven't won any conflict or war we've been predominantly engaged in since before 1950 if not going back further? If that ticks you off, don't blame me. Blame the American government and military. Read the history, literature, the experts who will to go there. We haven't won a fucking war since we Helped in the cause for WW 2! And yet we beat our chests and issue threats to the rest of the world that they better play by our rules or else. Any wonder why China doesn't seem too scared? Why other countries are so terrified of our threats that they engage in proactive cyberwarfare against us daily and increasingly where it can’t be seen so easily, space conflicts that will lead to warfare on that front as well? Or that there are a number of burgeoning regional hegemonies now? We're known as the most violent society of earth. There are more guns than people in this country. Our homicide rate is higher than the next 10+ 1st world countries combined. And we have no intention of fixing that. Our kids watch the bloodiest movies and shows, play the most insane FPS games,

Game: Half-Life (Valve)

and yet... Those of you old enough to remember Somalia... Mogadishu. Do you remember? Black Hawk Down? 

Black Hawk Down (2001) – Columbia Pictures

Battle of Mogadishu – The Mirror

Gruesome movie, but war is hell. And what happened? American saw a sad picture, but one others see every day in many other parts of the world -- corpses. American corpses. We saw Black Somalian crowds dragging mostly naked (at least one WAS naked, white genitals exposed to the world) dead WHITE US soldiers through the streets of Mogadishu while they laughed and partied and our collective stomachs got sick and we started screaming WTF are we doing there? 

Credit: IconicPhotos

[For what it’s worth, I intentionally left out the photos of the completely naked and mutilated body of a dead US soldier being dragged through throngs on the streets of Mogadishu. For what it’s worth…]

So what happened? Took no time for us to cut and run! Cause we're chickenshit. And to my horror apparently we've also been as racist as ever and just hidden it too. The past 5-15 years have more than proven that. We go back to the safety of our pretend fun FPS killing games while elsewhere little girls going to the stream to wash clothes in their villages face the prospect of having the limbs blown off by US mines (and Soviet) all over the world daily. And what have we heard since? NO Boots on the Ground! Air Force only. And now drones. All of which have proven to be ineffective (read the stats on Vietnam if you doubt me -- take a look on the number, type, frequency of munitions dropped on N Vietnam alone, the horrific shit it did and just how horribly it caused them to want to cut and run -- which would be NOT AT ALL! Because they were strong and dedicated and we were there against our will [our soldiers, not the damn politicians], didn't know why we were fighting and dying, what was being accomplished, what the lies about the daily body counts were about, why we were even involved in what seemed more and more like a civil war the US had taken sides on and was driving at the expense of everyone and for what exactly?) because you NEED BOOTS ON THE GROUND but badass killer Americans are so gutless and weak that during W's Iraq, the government started keeping the media from getting near planes returning with filled coffins covered by flags and they were no longer allowed to show them on TV ... because America didn't have the guts to handle it. We can offer our hypocritical hollow "thought and prayers” (which makes me want to puke) at American mass murders, drive bys, gang wars, white domestic lone wolf terrorists preying on minority, "liberal" and other perceived (it's called brainwashing) "enemies," with the last group of which many Americans now know the FBI and other agencies have labeled as the biggest security threat to this country. Not Muslims, not brown immigrants, not Spanish speakers, etc. Wannabe Aryans "Killing In The Name Of" White Jesus, white christian nationalists, violent white separatists, Fascists or fascist wannabes, fans of autocrats, "antigovernment" "Outsiders" who become Insiders but insist they're still Outside, brainwashed, braindead, psychotic ignored, neglected and Pissed Off nihilistic kids in need of serious help (Columbine was a good starting point for that discussion) AND their goddamn FANS, most disgusting of which has been Anne Coulter, who exposes so much blood lust for "The Other" (nearly everyone not white, insane conservative and full of shit) that it says something disturbing that these people are even allowed mass media audiences in which to egg others on to murder and sedition. We find these people in our christian churches. Yes, it IS that simple. And if you seriously believe Jesus was about peace and love and that's maybe been corrupted by some current religious leaders, you haven't read your holy book -- just the devotions your churches urge you to read cause the Bible is just so, well, big and heavy and boring and shit. Jesus said he came to "divide" families, turn families against each other, split the family unit up, and yeah, he also instructed his new group of clueless zombie disciples to go buy swords -- sell their cloaks if they needed money to do so -- and this is peace and love? And yes, I've seen and read christian apologists try to explain these, usually in "fulfilling" prophecy, but there is so much scholarship and evidence available now that shows virtually none of this so-called "prophecy" a) applied - got taken out of context, which ironically is what these apologists says this sword passage has done -- b) was completely made up (especially by Matthew) or never existed, c) was twisted so very badly and obviously to fit the gospel authors' agendas, d) were (purposely) misinterpreted again to fit agendas, etc., and that doesn't count the massive discrepancies in the gospels alone, such as which of the two birth, hide/flight, return to the public stories do you believe in because it buggers the mind to say you believe in both. And yeah, most of you forget there are two different ones from two different times that do not coincide with each other, but theologians work bigger miracles than the disciples to get things to fit, so WTH? (The fact that there is no independent or even literal evidence that "Nazareth" physically existed at the time the messiah allegedly lives is another laugher...)

So anyway, how do you like them apples? (Back to the present) We sure do feel fine about assassinating towel heads from the air, right? Back to the more main point of the book. America IS decadent. Just look at the pandemic starting around April 2020 in the US. Americans used every excuse in the book to call bullshit on scientific reality and why? Aside from what we would learn were a shocking number of crazies around, it was INCONVENIENT! It kept people from the bars and clubs and churches and beaches and schools and on and on so people broke rules, led by ditto brain, and insisted on their "religious freedom," which was bullshit because I would support that IF it involved just them. If you want to Jim Jones it, to play Russian Roulette with two chambers loaded, be my damn guest, we need to thin the herd anyway. But what people didn't GET and then didn't give a shit about, led by our christian community, was that not only was it potentially suicidal, but HOMICIDAL as well, and what about MY freedom to not be near an invisible killer coming straight from church, which was the first place they all started getting sick and dying even while they still denied it (oh yeah, the country that led the world in inventions, new tech, etc., was now a country of science haters and deniers and its citizens continued to pray to their fairies in the sky while completely disregarding their god's orders, rules, commands, etc.,) and on and on, but the fact that EVERYTHING was more important than not only your life, but your damn neighbor's life -- who gave a shit about them anyway? -- that Republican leaders wanted to have the elderly volunteer to fucking DIE for the sake of the others, the children, the economy, etc. (the Texas governor, an Indiana rep, etc. And they weren't leading by example, remember!). How far off from Mengele was THAT? Those of us with brains and hearts thought there were some sick fucks in this country who might say that, but surely there were only a few. Then came ditto brain's maggots, KKKers, skinheads, white christian nationalists, racists, violent separatists, and now they were mainstream and there were tens of millions of them and where the hell had they been hidden, but it was obvious now that America was a country full of rot at its very core, hidden under Hollywood faux glitz, and it turned out tens of millions of Americans WANT fascism instead of democracy -- are fascists, without even understanding the history of that term, nor the actual definition -- and we want to enjoy our martinis and our new Trek bikes and getting rid of the Section 8 housing down the road to build new condos and upscale developments so yeah, this general concept kinda, sorta resonates with me in my own way I guess. Americans are a sad people, pathetic, an embarrassment to our ancestors and while it's horrible that "innocents" have to die because of psychos, these are the people who have been saying for centuries that all babies born are born guilty and worthy of death and eternal torture because of some alleged myth a couple of people allegedly did thousands of years ago, and while I can hold grudges for life, I tend not to be such a goddamn bastard as to sentence an entire species I claim to have created and love like my own children -- like the one I'm going to send to commit suicide to save these children who are guilty by association and everything about that just reeks of the most ludicrous lines of non-reason, ration or brain function -- you sentence billions and billions of people to eternal damnation cause a couple of people none of the others ever met screwed up one time??? That is insane psychotic! What sicko does that? Oh well, a Hitler. Stalin. Ditto brain. Pol Pot. But even put together, none of them could ever match what this imaginary freak people worship is given credit for having done. And he's worshipped! And we wonder why other civilized nations look at us in wonder while laughing their asses off at our stupidity. Or they were laughing until the American Taliban started killing for Jesus. Not so funny now. Book? Recommend? Oh, I recommend a lot of things, beginning with educating ourselves about our country's history (Hawaii, Cuba, Puerto Rico, Philippines, etc., et al), about reality, about politics, about brainwashing, about many things, and yeah, how the US is rotten with lazy, entitled, spoiled, WEAK people who can't and won't face fact-base reality just because they don't like it and their own fantasies are now their own realties.

Welcome to a dystopia the best sci fi writers in history could never have come up with in their worst nightmares.

 

February 2, 2022

Scott Holstad