CounterPunch
by Col. Dan Smith
04/02/08
Meeting the need for compact, powerful pistols and other small arms is a vast industry, one that, in the United States, started in the three decades prior to the U.S. Civil War.So it was no great surprise, seven years after the U.S. defeated the Taliban in Afghanistan and five years after Saddam Hussein’s army dissolved in Iraq, to find in the Fiscal Year 2008 National Defense Authorization Act (Public Law 110-181) some congressional action to procure small arms to help rebuild the armies of these countries...
http://counterpunch.org/smith04022008.html
Republicans, Democrats and the militarization of society
Intellectual Conservative
by Jack Kerwick
06/13/08
There is something strangely vaudevillian about contemporary American politics. ‘The Right’ — the Republican/neo-conservative Party — labors incessantly to sustain the popular impression that it alone exists to advance such ‘conservative first principles’ as ‘limited government,’ ‘individual liberty,’ and a ’strong national defense.’ Those on ‘the Right’ are committed to ‘lower taxes,’ ‘deregulation,’ and, in general, ‘free enterprise.’ They are also committed to waging and winning ‘the War on Terror,’ however long that may take. ‘The Left’ — the Democratic/welfare-state liberal Party — misses no opportunity to reinforce the deceptive self-image that it has worked so long and hard at crafting. It would have Americans believe that it alone is the party of ‘civil rights,’ and ‘racial, gender, and economic equality.’ Those on ‘the Left’ complain about the militaristic and imperialistic aspirations of their right-wing opponents, and about how much more constructively the resources that have been deployed to fund America’s military adventures abroad could have been spent right here at home. Neither the Republican neo-conservative nor Democrat welfare-state liberal parties seem to be aware of how each is but an expression of one and the same style of politics...
http://tinyurl.com/4thxu4
Informant: Thomas L. Knapp
http://freepage.twoday.net/search?q=militarization+America
http://freepage.twoday.net/search?q=neocons
http://freepage.twoday.net/search?q=Col.+Dan+Smith
