Email problems

To the folks who have sent me any email recently, my Gmail account seems to be a bit borked so while I can see that there are new messages there on my Google homepage, I can’t actually access anything to read them nor, obviously, respond.

So my apologies if you think I’ve just been rude or anything to that effect, I’ll get back to you soon as I can.

On the “War Tax”, as proposed by Democrats

For the past few years the question has been at the front of everyone’s mind: how in the world are we going to pay for the “War on Terror”? Somehow the president and the GOP decided that it makes sense to spend nearly a trillion dollars on a war, but not only do no real economic buckling-down, but in fact lower taxes. Our surplus to deficit swing of nearly ten trillion dollars should give you an idea of how well that’s been going.

A solution has popped up, though. Three House Democrats, including my very own Jack Murtha, have proposed a bill that would increase taxes to pay for the war. Unsurprisingly, it came under heavy fire from Republicans. Surprisingly, it came under heavy fire from Democrats as well.

“Just as I have opposed the war from the outset … I am opposed to a war surtax,” said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.

That’s great, Nancy. I opposed the war from the outset too, but unfortunately unless we find a way to make a pill that makes us crap out hundred dollar bills then we’re going to have to pass the cost to someone at some point. If not us, then our children or our grandchildren are going to be shouldering the near trillion dollar bill the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have built up.

So I ask the world at large: why shouldn’t we pay the bill now? Not only should taxes go up to pay for next year’s chunk of the war, but there should be a law in place that requires that taxes go up to finance any war. Period.

Israel confirms air attack on Syria

A month ago reports surfaced claiming that Israel had sent some warplanes into Syria and dropped a few bombs, reports which Israel naturally denied. Thus sparked another “Israel v Everyone Else” debate.

The hook is that the strike did happen, and Israel has now admitted it.

Military censors continued to censor other details, including the target and what kind of forces took part.

Syrian President Bashar Assad told the British Broadcasting Corp. on Monday that Israeli warplanes attacked an “unused military building” after air defense systems confronted the aircraft last month and said Damascus reserves the right to retaliate.

Assad pointed out that he doesn’t have any plans on retaliating but that they reserve the right to. That kind of language should be good and comforting to everyone who’s never heard it before.

What is most baffling about this is that we don’t seem to care if Israel does these kinds of things. My position on Israel/Palestine is no secret, I don’t deny that I think Palestine has just as much of a right to the land as Israel and that the pre-1967 borders should be plenty fair.

Not matter what side of the debate you’re on, I’d imagine it’s pretty universal that warplanes from one side can’t go flying over the other and start dropping bombs. If Syria even threw a rock over into Israel there’d be a huge to-do and you can bet Israel would have one of their famous overreactions that results in a month or so of battle. An air strike? That’d be all out war.

I like Israel and hope they do well. They’re a democracy and I like that. We need more. Unfortunately the double standard they’re given is one of the reasons countries like Iran are so pissed off all the time. Remember, Israel has nuclear weapons and they have a penchant for launching attacks on people in the area. Moreover, they’re being fed arms from the United States who also just happens to have about six or seven buttloads of nukes.

I always say we should imagine it from another perspective. Imagine for a moment if Iran and Iraq had a lot of nuclear weapons, and we didn’t. Now imagine that Iran is giving nukes to Iraq, and Iraq sends a plane over and attacks us. Think about what our response would be. Now give yourself a greater appreciation for Syria’s restraint in not calling for blood. Then again, that may be a by-product of living in an inherently unstable region and not wanting to exacerbate the problem.

Bottom line: if Middle Eastern peace is our goal, we need to come down on Israel with the same fervor we’d come down on anyone else if they pulled this kind of stunt.