What if the balloon really does go up?

[hardnox604008]

Dispatch from the front: the rebels in Syria are losing ground and the Russians and Iran are not backing down (that's why Kerry is calling for talks, that is what you do when you're losing).

Meanwhile, two of the three scandals that are currently working relate to that situation- Benghazi about the Libya/Syria arms nexus, AP gate about the Obama Admin going ape**bleep** over some leaks regarding one of our secret wars- Yemen in this case.

I know, I know. f John McCain, who wants boots on the gourng everywhere, was President we wouldn't have to have boots on the ground because nobody would dare do anything (might be a very limited degree of truth to it, but please save the Munich analogies) but the USA has already proved the obvious- nobody can afford modern conventional warfare- even the nation with the reserve currency- and our enemies are beginning to understand that very well.  Equally problematic is fighting a Clinton/Bosnia sort of a war from 40,000 feet, or in this case from a trailer in the desert in Nevada.

If you are for the current Dissembler in Chief I guess you are happy that he's not as crazy about putting troops in as the former DIC and/or you tolerate it because you like his position on some other policies (fill in the blank). If you're against the current DIC you're probably loving his discomfiture as payback to all the unfair sniping the former DIC took from the libs on similar topics and/or because you hate the current DIC because of his support of (fill in the blank).

Anyway, the last time our nation faced defeat- 2007 in Iraq- we chose to engage in a modest genocide by proxy that we called The Surge, with two front men made up as national heroes- a neo-nazi suffering from raging oral compulsiveness (McCrystal) and a philandering narcissist (Petraeus).  But we all sang God Bless America at every 7th inning stretch and the Lord delivered us victory- or actually a tie that we could call a victory and then quit, but who am I to question the mysterious ways of The Almighty?

Mencken defined a cynic as somebody who can't walk by flowers without looking for the casket and I'll accept that label or in my case I'm constantly on the lookout for a big Black Swan that I'm certain will someday land on this phoney baloney pond. I'm not immune from the sentiment that is held by the hedgies, ultra austerians etc. of being a little disappointed as the central banking/finance nexus of the world has so far easily wrung the neck of every one that came near.  Darn it, but they probably will have a couple tag team them someday and one will sneak in the back door but, for now, you have to be impressed. Or one of a whole different color doesn't fly in and leave that back door unguarded.

So what happens if the Swan of a Different Color happens to manifest itself 1914 style?  After 100 years of relative peace and progress in Europe before 1914, nobody could imagine a an impending war that was vastly more terrible and destructive than any other modern war to date.  

Can't happen?

[hardnox604008]

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/

"But I think that the linked Scott Lemieux post, which equates the austerian fixation on stagflation with the neocon fixation on Munich, is much closer to the mark."

"It was obvious during the runup to the Iraq war that what was going on in the minds of many hawks — and not just the neocons — was not so much a deep desire to drop lots of bombs and kill lots of people (although they were OK with that) as a deep desire to be seen as people who were willing to Do What Has to be Done. Men who have never risked, well, anything relished the chance to look in the mirror and see Winston Churchill looking back."

[Samnospam]

one theory is that Benghazi was Russian orchestrated to stop the arms going to Syria.

[hardnox604008]

Could be. Fair to assume that some intelligence service initiated it be it Iran, Syria or Russia or all the same thing.

Or of course, Israel, with the Bibi regime making no pretense about the fact that they much preferred Willard "you're fired but gee doesn't may hair look good" Romney.

And sort of like Rove going off about conceding on election night, nothing definitive but some curious timing in Romney's response.

BTW, in the race for biggest DIC, Obama gets some relief from the enemies that he keeps. 

The thing that I really don't know but wonder about is the questin of whether Israel's strategic position really is that bad or whether it is foremost a matter of Bibi's dangerously paranoid historical view.  I'm interested in Israel's security, I'm not interested in blowing up the world becasue of "never again."

[bruce MN]

What is really interesting is how much angst there seems to be over the fact that it hasn't popped, Why it hasn't notwithstanding. And, of course, how things continue to stagnat if not get much worse for untold numbers who were sure they were in the safe middle and put their trust in bagger fools and demagogues. http://m.startribune.com/politics/?id=208154791&c=y. Check out the numbers on women voters near the end.

[r3020]

---

@bruce MN wrote:
What is really interesting is how much angst there seems to be over the fact that it hasn't popped, Why it hasn't notwithstanding. And, of course, how things continue to stagnat if not get much worse for untold numbers who were sure they were in the safe middle and put their trust in bagger fools and demagogues. http://m.startribune.com/politics/?id=208154791&c=y. Check out the numbers on women voters near the end.

---

Speaking of fools and demagogues....

snip-

While many Americans were tuned into news coverage of the massive damage from  tornadoes ravaging the state of Oklahoma, Rhode Island Democratic Sen. Sheldon  Whitehouse took to the Senate floor to rail against his Republican colleagues  for denying the theory of anthropogenic global warming.

Whitehouse spent 15 minutes chastising GOP senators and justified his remarks  by alluding to states that seek federal assistance in the wake of natural  disasters.

“So, you may have a question for me,” Whitehouse said. “Why do you care? Why  do you, Sheldon Whitehouse, Democrat of Rhode Island, care if we Republicans run  off the climate cliff like a bunch of proverbial lemmings and disgrace  ourselves? I’ll tell you why. We’re stuck in this together. We are stuck in this  together. When cyclones tear up Oklahoma and hurricanes swamp Alabama and  wildfires scorch Texas, you come to us, the rest of the country, for billions of  dollars to recover. And the damage that your polluters and deniers are doing  doesn’t just hit Oklahoma and Alabama and Texas. It hits Rhode Island with  floods and storms. It hits Oregon with acidified seas, it hits Montana with  dying forests. So, like it or not, we’re in this together.”

Read more:  http://dailycaller.com/2013/05/20/democratic-senator-goes-on-anti-gop-rant-over-climate-change-as-to...

[Samnospam]

The only thing going on that I could see sucking in enough of the world to make a Krugman giddy is the China India dispute.  I could see how that could turn into ww3.

[kraft-t]

Perhaps Senator White house can remember the republican opposition to hurricane relief for new York New jersey and connecticutt.

Perhaps a couple of the Oklahoma senators might have had a change of heart in such a short period of time.