By Dee McLachlan
The mainstream media has been saturated in the last few days with Dr David Kilcullen. He’s been on ABC’s Lateline, 10’s The Project and in most printed media. The Australian is pitching his new book: “Blood Year: Terror and the Islamic State.”
In Foreignpolicy.com they quote you saying:
“There would be no ISIS if we hadn’t invaded Iraq in the first place... There also would not be an ISIS if we hadn’t withdrawn from Iraq and just left the environment to hang for a few years. So I think you can blame President Obama, you can blame President Bush; you can certainly blame Prime Minister Maliki.” [my emphasis]
Congratulations, Dr Kilcullen, for pointing out that the West started this horrendous debacle.
The Saturday Paper writes this about you and your book:
“…We set out to eliminate al-Qaeda and instead, after a full decade of fighting, we got the Islamic State. (and)
“The ‘mindless obstinacy’ of then-US Secretary of Defence, Donald Rumsfeld, resulted in what Kilcullen labels ‘the greatest strategic screw-up since Hitler’s invasion of Russia’.”
But Dr Kilcullen, my applause stops there. You are in a privileged position to work out what’s going on.
You served 25 years as an army officer, diplomat, and policy advisor for the Australian and United States governments, in command and operational missions. In the US you served as Chief Strategist in the State Department’s Counter-terrorism Bureau (2005 to 2006), and served in Iraq as Senior Counterinsurgency Advisor to General David Petraeus (2007 and 2008), before becoming Special Advisor for Counterinsurgency to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. You hold a Ph.D. and were named one of the Foreign Policy Top 100 Global Thinkers in 2009.
Now you advise Western governments through your organisations, Caerus Global Solutions, and of First Mile Geo.
In your recent interviews, you refer to the invasion of Iraq as a “ERROR“, “ill-judged” and “reckless.” And the Obama administration’s “compounded ERRORS” led to the “back-sliding” in Iraq. And this has led to ISIS, along with Maliki.
Were you not aware of the memo disclosed by Retired General Wesley Clark in 2007? Surely, as Chief Strategist in the Office of the Coordinator for Counterterrorism at the US State Department, then senior advisor to General David Petraeus you would be aware of the plan to “destroy seven countries in five years,” revealed by Clark?
Why not mention this to the Australian audience?
Surely, you of all people, should know the assault on Iraq was DELIBERATE. It was no mistake of intelligence. It was a pre-planned invasion, and 9-11 and bin Laden were the pretexts.
I am so tired of experts like yourself, being interviewed ad infinitum on mainstream media, propagating the myth that al-Qaeda brought down 3 towers (YES, three towers with 2 planes) and managed to penetrate the most guarded building in the world — the Pentagon.
What a shameful sham.
Surely you, Dr Kilcullen, as a counter terrorism expert, would you understand that “the war on terror” was created by the powers that be to control us? Have you glanced at the evidence around the attacks on September 11, 2001? It is impossible that 19 Arabs were responsible.
Sadly, you are just another squeaky cog in the fraud machine.
Update:
A few hours ago, this was reported in the smallwarsjournel.com “David Kilcullen: Rise of Terror, Displacement is the ‘New Norm’.”
“The world must adjust to the growth of Islamic State and the displacement of millions of people from the Middle East as the “new normal”, according to former White House counter-terror chief David Kilcullen.”
Good friends. Saudi Arabia , as we speak, is deploying 350,000 troops and 20,000 tanks at Syrian border. The media silence! Russia will have no other resort than to defend with nuclear arms. This has nothing to do with religion. It is all about money and oil. War has become the only profitable business left for the 1% that rule ,but now more importantly , fear us. Tell everyone you know and let’s stop the murder of innocent people everywhere. Everything we have been told is lies.
Dear 56, if you can expand in your phrase “fear us” I would appreciate it.
I don’t see a Travel Advisory for Australians that would indictae war, at
http://www.bing.com/search?q=smarttraveller.gov.au&form=APMCS1
“Making everything sound the way you want it to sound”: This is the said ex-pat Aussie, Killcullen, in the business he founded:
“While many in the world of data science see data as only ones and zeros, Caerus sees data for what it is: a digital representation of a social process.
“Finding patterns and anomalies is not as important as finding meaning. Caerus combines technical and subject matter expertise with field experience and deep knowledge of the needs of national security stakeholders
“to translate analytic findings into meaningful insights for decision-makers. Our analytical design approach brings this into focus to specify models, validate findings, and support decision-makers.”
Yep
Another deluded fool and/or liar!!
Dear Mary, all I meant was we are many they are few in total numbers. The fair outnumber the bad 10 to 1 or maybe 100 to 1.
Good. That is what I hoped you meant, 56.
I am always trying to gauge the ratio. When the Berlin wall fell in ’89 they say the records of the Stasi were opened up for all to view, and 30% of the East German population had been spies.
Probably most did not want the job. See how the FBI, or whatever we call these creeps, made some of Jahar Tsarnaev’s friends testify against him, on threat of deportation.
OMG. David KILLCULLEN reading the script. Can we see it for what it is. It’s like the ‘Kolling’ sign ,in front of RNSH in St.Leonards, that has been there for the past 10 years.
56—to which script you refer. He did a doctorate in the script
What a crap merchant, the bloke’s definitely a ‘player’. I ran into so many of them in the Army – just a self serving POS that will play along with even the most absurd lies in order to work his way up the ladder.
He’s probably got a chest full of fruit cocktail that he never earned to go along with all his other notorious ‘positions of importance’. The PTB will display him (and he’ll eat it up) when ever they need some ‘junk science’ on military affairs or ‘appropriate’ intelligence from the field.
He’s a symptom of the Western military mindset, BS over substance. – When a real battle starts, you want to be as far away from one of these clowns as you can – they specialise in failure.
G’Day Dee/Gumshoe Readers,
SUBJECT: Kilcullen’s Global Phoenix Program
http://poxamerikana.com/2015/09/04/uncle-sam-damned-in-nam-part-one/
http://poxamerikana.com/2015/09/11/uncle-sam-damned-in-nam-part-two/
Great post, timely and on the money.
The above links to my website/blog focussed on aspects of the Vietnam War derived from amongst other sources/reference points (incl. documentaries and films), Nick Turse‘s Kill Anything that Moves: The Real Story of America in Vietnam; William Shawcross‘ Sideshow: Kissinger, Nixon & the Destruction of Cambodia; and Douglas Valentine‘s The Phoenix Program: America’s Use of Terror in Vietnam.
The latter book was the definitive book on the CIA’s infamous Phoenix Program, itself designed to identify and “neutralize” — via infiltration, capture, terrorism, torture, and assassination) the infrastructure of the National Liberation Front of South Vietnam. As the records show, more than 80,000 civilians were murdered, with countless more injured and displaced under this program, all for nought. America still lost!
Part of the purpose in penning this two-parter was to highlight the many parallels between the inferno unleashed in Indo-China by the U.S. and those unleashed more recently in the Middle East, North Africa and South Asia (MENASA). Those “parallels” are uncanny of course, leading reasonable, rational people to conclude inescapably that the only thing we learn from history is that we learn nothing from history.
In respect of the estimable David Kilcullen and his views on ISIS and on the MENASA debacle in general, here are a couple of pertinent extracts from the posts.
—Beginning of Extract—
…..additional, contemporary context and perspective is provided by Douglas Valentine himself. In the author’s introduction in the original edition of the Phoenix book published in 1990, he made it clear he wanted to,
‘[Scrutinize] the program and the people who participated in it, [and by] employing the program as a symbol of the dark side of the human psyche, to articulate the subtle ways in which the Vietnam War changed how Americans think about themselves’.
In short Valentine was attempting to show way back then how a nation that purports to be one ‘ruled by laws and an ethic of fair play, could create a program like Phoenix’. He further added:
‘This book is about terror and its role in political warfare. It will show how, as successive American governments sink deeper and deeper into the vortex of covert operation–ostensibly to combat….. terrorism and [assorted] insurgencies–the American people gradually lose touch with the democratic ideals that once defined their national self-concept. This book asks what happens when Phoenix comes home to roost.’
Of course his intention then one presumes remains the same, and the following extract appears to support that. Taken from his introduction of the book in its latest edition, published in February 2014, it provides an even more chilling and disturbing perspective on the reality of the here-and-now and the history that preceded and spawned that reality.
‘The Phoenix has landed. The ultimate fusion of bureaucracy and psychological warfare, it serves as the model for America’s homeland security apparatus, as well as its global war on terror. This is not a theory. In a paper published in [the] Small Wars Journal in September 2004, [Australian-born] Lt. Col. David Kilcullen called for a “global Phoenix program”.’
And whilst Valentine notes somewhat resignedly that Kilcullen himself would become one of the US Government’s top counterinsurgency advisors, he also adds that, ‘[Phoenix] terms like “high-value target” and “neutralization” are now as common as Phoenix strategies and tactics. And the process of institutionalizing Phoenix, conceptually and programmatically, is just beginning.’
To underscore further the above parallels, in a recent essay, John Pilger, veteran Aussie journalist, filmmaker and perennial thorn in the side of the demonic hegemons of the Anglo-American-Zionist (and not infrequently Australian) power elites, offered a persuasive—indeed, irresistible—comparative analysis of the rise of Pol Pot and his Khmer Rouge rabble with that of the ISIS “rabble”. The only difference seemed to be that the Khmer Rouge weren’t directly armed, funded and trained by the Americans! They were much more a ‘home-grown’, grassroots entity.
But like ISIS, the rise of the Khmer Rouge was a direct result of American militarism and interventionist tendencies and the power vacuum that inevitably result. Of this there can be little doubt. And in his op-ed piece, Pilger as usual doesn’t pull any punches. After observing that ‘the Nixon-Kissinger bombing of Cambodia unleashed a torrent of suffering from which that country has never recovered’, he adds,
‘[T]he same is true of the Blair-Bush crime in Iraq. With impeccable timing, Henry Kissinger’s latest self-serving tome has just been released with its satirical title, “World Order”. In one fawning review, Kissinger is described as a “key shaper of a world order that remained stable for a quarter of a century“. Tell that to the people of Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos, Chile, East Timor and all the other victims of his “statecraft”. Only when “we” recognise the war criminals in our midst will the blood begin to dry.’
Sound like another (never-ending) amorality tale from the Land of Hope and Dreams? Something like that. We can all but hope that he is wrong.
—End of Extract—
In summary, the beliggerent hubris of the neocon warmongers in Washington, and their compatriots in the Pentagon in particular, knows few bounds. More’s the pity I say. Uncle Sam’s version of that recurring trope of Empire, the ‘civilising mission’—spreading peace, love, understanding, freedom, democracy and liberty to all and sundry—appears like it will go on till the end of empire or until they complete the mission.
Whichever comes first!
So, maybe not so “never ending” after all then?
Thank you, Greg. A global phoenix? Arrest Kilcullen forthwith.
Now let’s get right down to it. Did the Kissinger machine make the decision to crucify the Cambodians in their hundreds of thousands (rather than the genocide being what happens when there is a power vacuum.). I think yes.
Hi Mary, Although it would clearly be a stretch to suggest that Kissinger (and Nixon) was responsible directly for the deaths of of 2 million plus Cambodians, the power vacuum premise as you have suggested was the likely catalyst for the rise of Pol Pot. Yet these kinds of events in history don’t happen in a complete vacuum, as Kissinger’s actions culminated in said “vacuum”, the prospect of which was something he would have been acutely aware of.
Kissinger’s intimate knowledge of history overall — and especially that of his own adopted country — coupled with the man’s duplicity, venality, hubris and amorally reckless disregard for the potential blowback that results from interfering in the affairs of other countries (“pissant, third world backwaters” as I believe he termed them), he of all people knew the existential risks. In this respect Kissinger is little different from Pol Pot, Pinochet, Suharto and any of the other tin-pot potentates that benefitted directly or indirectly from his Machiavellian machinations.
As a postsctipt, one of history’s most ironic absurdities was of course “Hank the Hunk” being awarded the 1973 Nobel Peace Prize — jointly with his North Vietnamese counterpart Le Duc Tho — for brokering the truce between the two combatants thus effectively ending (more or less) the Vietnam War. At least LDT — without doubt the most deserving of the two recipients by a country mile — had the common decency and self respect to refuse his, partly because by accounts he didn’t want to share his with Kissinger, which was understandable. For his part, Hank accepted his award “with humility”, which considering the man lived and worked in a humility-free zone, must have been procured at short notice by one of the ushers at the awards ceremony.
Not a big fan of “The Hunk” then Greg? Not on your Dame Nellie!
Dee, I would just add a couple of brief points to your article. You rightly cite the Clark evidence, but there is more. Seymour Hersh in an article in the New Yorker in 2007 wrote about the US/Israeli strategy to break up Iraq and Syria inso statelets as part of a wider ploy to control the Middle East and its resources.
The second point is that a 2012 DIA document was leaked last year which sets out how the US has created and used terrorist groups to facilitate its wider geopolitical goals. This includes ISIS.
Greg makes some excellent points above, and also reinforces how terror is an essential component of the US armoury. Project Phoenix was only one of a number of similar programs. There were similar programs in Africa and Latin America. Apart from the sources Greg cites, I would also recommend reading Bill Blum’s several excellent books.
Let’s get right down to it. It also includes Haiti and Port Arthur.
Big thanks to Greg Maybury and James O’Neill and Douglas Valentine for the info. Must read the full Maybury articles.
Someone told me that Valentine is now disabled with a neurological condition. Aren’t they cruel? How can we whack these bastards, whether they are wearing fruit cocktail or otherwise.
Oh, and thanks to Shulze and Dee also. And 56. Let’s get right down to it. I am sick of beating around the goddamed bush.
Love to read professor Clive williams comments on this article and the comments.
Of course we all know that the learned Professor is one of Australia’s most learned experts on terrorism and terrorists put forward by the mass media and ABC. After all, he demonstrated it when addressing the ‘gullible’ mob of skeptics in Canberra, as brroadcast by the ABC. From memory it was the drum program on ABC.
He was of the view that those who questioned the official government 911 conspiracy were conspiracy theorists. (Etc)
Have to love those educating our kids in universities of learning and charging the students with HECS liabilities.
Academics teaching about Terrorism? May I quote my Gumshoe article on the German journalist Udo Ulfkotte? —
“The casual info shared after lectures. Despite Udo’s troubles, someone arranged for him to teach a National Security course at a university. (Who teaches it at your school? Have a chat with them.) Udo was pleased when various students, mostly related to government, approached him confidentially after class, with some hot info about the bad Muslims. That is to say, they supplied him with canned disinformation. Bojinka-type nonsense. Come on, Udo, name some names, please.”
Perhaps Kilkullen is one of the good professor’s students?
Could explain why Kilcullen appears to be ignorant of the pre-911 plan to take out 7 countries in five years as exposed by Wesley Carke to Amy Goodman. (And the 911 mass murders)
And ‘ending! with Iran! But we need Syria to do that.
Bloody Putin, just a spoiler?
The documents and information to explain and quantify that the popular main stream “reality” is a lie are bountiful and beyond dispute if they achieve fair consideration.
The battle front lies in the realm of what is the correct dynamic of action that can achieve a more honest political outcome.
A massively outnumbered force can win victories but that will be proportional to the efficiency of their action which can only break through the enemy line if all the force available is combined and applied soundly to a common strategic vulnerable point.
The weapons are political courage, tenacity, skills and abilities.
This assumes common short and long term objectives do exist.
This relies upon the integrity and loyalty in the common agreement and strategy of attack.
The mode of operation for a tiny force against an overwhelming enemy must be in essence “political guerrilla warfare” where small cells planning and acting with a balance between independence and a common purpose and philosophy.
Short, medium and long term strategies must mesh efficiently and intelligently.
The most dangerous threat to monopoly power is when individuals combine with “CORRECT” political strategies of social dynamics, armed with “CORRECT” evidence and information, and practicing exacting abilities in “CORRECT” critical thinking, reasoning and logic.
There are many examples of political action in Australia where one or two of these elements were achieved.
I’d like to see a couple of those examples, Christopher.
Christopher, your arguent is flawless, so long as there is a quorum of people intested in working logically. But look around you and you’ll see that most people go on emotions.
I think the main emotion that needs attention is fear. Can you come up with a way to tackle the fear problem?
I think the Martin Bryant issue has the ingredients to become very dangerous to concentrated power if small groups of Tasmanian’s decide to set about the political task.
Fear is a very significant problem but when the curtain is drawn back in front of the public view, tiny harmless figures who manipulate special effects is all that really exist.
Zheesh! Holy daddy! Have you said it or what?
So glad I asked, Christopher.
I might add, the abilities of the power seeking class to create the “special effects” and deflect any public discussion of their masterful activities is now deeply embedded in all our institutions and despite a number of new political associations actively rebuilding or forming, I see no fully honest and soundly based activity in that space.
I am referring to the likes of Pauline Hanson’s One Nation and a number of other shallow but populist political groups.
There are significant numbers of populations all about the globe who are unsatisfied with our present direction and condition but this potentially large political energy force is successfully shattered, splintered and contaminated so it’s effect is totally neutralized, if not brought into the purpose of assisting the very objectives that participants believe they are opposing.
It is naturally my point of view that only when these Machiavellian aspects of our reality become commonly recognized and respected for their critical significance, is there any possibility that the honest social dynamic and technical possibilities will become preeminent above myth and lies.
Mary, as I know your understanding is tuned and conscious, we can take solace in the evidence of cathedral architecture and symphonic masterpiece that mankind is always in possession of amazing capacity which can be released and given flesh.
“despite a number of new political associations actively rebuilding or forming, I see no fully honest and soundly based activity in that space.
I am referring to the likes of Pauline Hanson’s One Nation and a number of other shallow but populist political groups.”
I don’t know about any of the newer ‘political parties’, but One Nation was (and may still be) a counter-intelligence operation – a ‘controlled opposition’ being run by the spooks (Hanson was clueless). Long story on that one, something that Gumshoes should do an article on as it could be instructive to anyone that thinks a new political party is all that is needed to fix things in Oz.
It’s true I like cathedral architecture, but I really get off on the circulatory system. Just think about it, Christopher, THE CIRCULATORY SYSTEM! All that blood pumpin’ around there all day, every day. Man, that’s fabulous.
And yes I can enjoy a symphony, but are you old enough to remember Janis? Music was our way of solidarity in the Sixties and Seventies. Can Beethoven beat “Me and Bobby McGee”?
Terry, thanks for the info. I did not know about the Spooks running One Nation (altho the names of such things are often a give-away). Well, it just goes to show what a bunch of silly billies they are, that they would allow such ideas to crop up around the nation. I thought Pauline was great. And if she was clueless about the spooks, that doesn’t detract — she should have (and did) put her message out.
Have you got anything on Madison? Was he run by spooks? Why were Jefferson and Franklin in Paree when they should have been in Philly? Not that it matters. The Constitution speaks for itself. As Christopher Brooks would say, Reasoning created the Constitution, as indeed it did.
Yay Pauline. Yay Madison. Yay Janis Joplin. (died at age 27).
Kilcullen was on Q&A last night. It was quite instructive on a number of levels. It is clear that Q & A has a defined outer limit as to what constitutes accepted comment and/or criticism. There is a narrative that needs to be protected, as for example in any discussion on ISIS. Commentators are allowed to say how terrible/bloodthirsty/primeval etc they are, but never to suggest that they serve as instruments of the foreign powers that create and sustain them.
Thus, one questioner asked why was it that Israel had never been attacked. The stock Israeli apologist on the panel claimed that Israel had been attacked, albeit indirectly. He must have sensed the audience’s derision at that absurdity. However, Tony Jones (and nobody else either) raised the fact that wounded ISIS fighters are being treated in Israeli military hospitals on the Golan Heights, as even the Israeli government has admitted. For the ABC and the Australian mainstream commentariat generally, that would raise too many uncomfortable questions so the issue is avoided.
Kilcullen is completely in this tradition. You will never hear from him and his ilk the role played by the US in fomenting terror at least since WW2 as an instrument of state policy. The words Operation Gladio (Europe), or Operation Condor (Latin America), or Operation Phoenix (Vietnam) never pass the lips of Q & A panellists.
In this morning’s SMH retired General Peter Leahy mildly criticises the lack of a strategy in Afghanistan, and then goes on to say what fine fellows/women the ADF are. It would be revolutionary in Australian terms if he actually raised some rather important points, such as the fake justification for the invasion in 2001; the role bin Laden played on behalf of the CIA 1979-89; that al Qaeda was an invention of the Americans (as Brzezinski boasted in his book The Grand Chessboard), etc etc.
If our major media outlets exist simply to manage perception and never discuss the real issues or even simply inform their readers about what is going on, then we are doomed to repeat the errors of the past.
James, you won’t believe me but I take umbrage when you say “the US” did this or that. Huh? Who? Wha?
Maybe you are referring to a bunch of impostors who actually are World Government’s servants. They ain’t my servants and I own the American government (as does every red-blooded Madisonian American).
P.S. I occasionally exaggerate, but you get the gist.
As for Mr. Fruit Cocktail being allowed to get away with it, watch out for Dee. She has the ABC in her sights, baaaaad.
Mary, I use the term “US Government” as a shorthand. Obama is the front man for the people who really make the decisions, but to discuss that would take more space than comments permit.
Notwithstanding Obama’s puppet status, the acts that I and others complain about are done in the name of the US government and they therefore cannot avoid culpability.
I wish you were correct when you say that you and other Americans “own” the US government, but I am afraid that it is not true and probably never has been.
I can conspire, can’t I?
James,
http://www.abc.net.au/tv/qanda/txt/s4398247.htm
You are on the money here at/on all points. I’m sure I’m not the only one becoming increasingly concerned — indeed, frustrated — at the unwillingness of the our beloved “Aunty” aka the ABC to give equal air-time to both sides of the narratives concerning some of the big issues of our time, whether it be Iraq, Syria, the Ukraine or elsewhere.
Last night’s Q&A (see link above) was another glaring example of that lopsided public debate, where there appeared to be little contention amongst the panelists about the issues discussed, the Syrian conflict being one example. Nor did the estimable convenor/referee Tony Jones (arguably one of the ABC’s Best and Brightest) appear overly keen to challenge any contentious points, pursue alternative views, or even [to] play devil’s advocate.
It seemed also that Q&A audience members and any potential questioners are vetted carefully before being selected, all seamlessly engineered so as not to spook the ‘anti-Aunty horses’ in the government, the conservative opinionocracy, or Rupert’s minions over at The Australian and its devoted, albeit deluded readership.
As for the tediously ubiquitous David Kilcullen’s condemnation on Q&A of the Iraq invasion and occupation — belated as it was by at least a decade and possibly then some — it was hedging and conditional. He still sounds overall like an apologist for the Bush administration’s disastrous foreign policy, one which to all intents and purposes has admittedly changed little since the Great Black Hope snatched the keys to 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.
For example, there appeared to be little mention — much less discussion — of pertinent realities such as America’s instigation of the coup in the Ukraine, [and] the neo-Nazi influence of the present regime, [and] the downing of the MH-17 plane and who might have actually been responsible, to name a couple of contentious points relevant to the broader debate. (N.B.: You may recall, we both concurred in a private email a few weeks back [that] the ABC’s coverage of the recent Melbourne inquest into MH-17 left a lot to be desired.)
This not to mention Uncle Sam’s — all too often ably assisted by the Saudis, the Turks and the Israelis/Zionists amongst others — long standing, little publicised, but eminently well-documented support of sundry Islamist terrorist groups and murderous, right-wing insurgencies and its recidivistic propensity for regime change specifically and interfering in the affairs of other countries in general (with of course Syria, Yemen and the Ukraine being prime, but by no means the only, contemporary examples). Yes, you did allude to this dubious history, but it bears repeating. Again and again it would seem. And let’s not forget of course those dastardly, provocative and ‘aggro’ Gremlins in the Kremlin who keep relocating their country’s borders ever closer to various NATO countries and U.S. military bases.
On a more sober note, it should go without saying (and to the detriment of the larger debate it certainly did “go without saying” last night), that so many of today’s geopolitical problems — some now bordering on the existentially dangerous — have their provenance in America’s hegemonic pursuit of full spectrum dominance of the Big Blue Ball. This is the ‘pachyderm on the geopolitical patio’ as it were, the one that was blithely ignored by all and sundry of the esteemed panellists on Q&A. Don’t mention the war(monger)!
Memo to Q&A presenter Tony Jones: Jonesy, you should know better. If last night’s performance was any indication, it’s time to lift your game old son, and inject a bit more (actually, a lot more) diversity of political opinion on the Q&A panel. You could do well to also include a few more flies in the ointment (or devil’s advocates at least if you’re not comfortable in that role) in the audience, to challenge the prevailing group-think of your panelists.
Oh, and start subscribing to a few alternative and independent news and information sources to broaden your own (geo) political horizons. There’s no shortage of them! OMT/BTW — the advice herein is free, but my continued interest in watching Q&A — and the ABC in general — comes at a price. As hinted at in the opening paragraph, I’m sure I ain’t ‘on me Pat’ there.
Greg Maybury
poxamerikana.com
Greg, pray tell us more about the pachyderm.
Mary, Re “pachyderm”, see James’ comment, but I was referring, obliquely (albeit tongue-in-ckeekily), to the “elephant in the room”. Or to put it another way, the geopolitical issue du jour that dare not speak its name. Which is of course the PNAC (Project for the New American Century) inspired “full spectrum dominance” cum imperial aspirations of Uncle Sam’s minions, past and present, that are the root cause of the current geopolitical impasse and malaise.
Greg, a good argument. Don’t hold your breath waiting for the ABC to grow a spine. Ditto the Labor party.
Mary, re pachyderm, recall Trudeau’s famous comment about living next to the US: it was like sleeping with an elephant. One lived in fear the beast would roll over.
All
thank you for the comments about Q and A.
I noted that Killcullen was a guest so I went to bed, not worth considering as the usual BS of ABC would prevail.
Slept well.
Just sell the ABC to Murdock, pay off some debt and save a billion per year.
Jon Faine et all. stiff!
[…] James O’Neill, a barrister and Gumshoe contributor, wrote this as a comment on my Kilcullen article (extract): […]