Antics of the dogs of war.

January 29, 2003 6:49 AM

At the Wallow of the Military Order of the Carabao, our nation's military leaders smoke Cuban cigars, sing racist songs about Filipinos, and suck up to the defense industry.
posted by xowie (13 comments total)

Cuban cigars are wonderful. Very smooth, and expertly rolled.
posted by MidasMulligan at 6:55 AM on January 29, 2003

Sounds like a helluva party...
posted by PenDevil at 6:55 AM on January 29, 2003

"War is heaven, and peace is hell."

And this from a man our sons will be marching behind. sigh
posted by LouReedsSon at 7:36 AM on January 29, 2003

Things to be overheard during this year's Wallow:

-Party on, General Garth.
-Party on, Colonel Wayne.
-What, no chicks?
-Dude, where's my humvee?
etc

But seriously: can we really believe that a certified "alternative lifestyle" like the Village Voice will report accurately on anything army-related? Think about it.
posted by 111 at 7:39 AM on January 29, 2003

Leftover from TDR's Rough Rider amatuer army days.
posted by stbalbach at 7:45 AM on January 29, 2003

Maybe they could sing this:

"......Clean the johns with a rag, boys
Clean the johns with a rag
If you like you can use your flag, boys
If you like you can use your flag
We've got too much money we're looking for toys
And guns will be guns and boys will be boys
But we'll gladly pay for all we destroy
'Cause we're the Cops of the World, boys
We're the Cops of the World

Please stay off of the grass, boys
Please stay off of the grass
Here's a kick in the ass, boys
Here's a kick in the ass
We'll smash down your doors, we don't bother to knock
We've done it before, so why all the shock?
We're the biggest and toughest kids on the block
'Cause we're the Cops of the World, boys
We're the Cops of the World

When we butchered your son, boys
When we butchered your son
Have a stick of our gum, boys
Have a stick of our buble-gum
We own half the world, oh say can you see
The name for our profits is democracy
So, like it or not, you will have to be free
'Cause we're the Cops of the World, boys
We're the Cops of the World" - From Phil Ochs' "Cops of the World"

the copy of the song that I linked to kindly provides the song's chords too.
posted by troutfishing at 8:37 AM on January 29, 2003

Hey 111, even "alternative lifestyle" types will die over the actions of these idiots. Perhaps that appeals to you, I don't know, but I have a problem with any celebration, mis-reported or not, that celebrates death. BTW, who paid for that party?
posted by LouReedsSon at 9:06 AM on January 29, 2003

Richard Brautigan, in "The Hawkline Monster...", wrote this aside about the US supression of the Philippine rebellion:

"Cameron was carrying a long narrow trunk over his shoulder. The trunk contained a sawed-off twelve-gauge pump shotgun, a 25:35 Winchester rifle, a 30:40 Krag, two .38 Caliber revolvers and an automatic .38 caliber pistol that Cameron had bought from a soldier in Hawaii who was just back from the Philippines where he had been fighting the rebels for two years.
"What kind of pistol is that?" Cameron had asked the soldier. They had been in a bar having some drinks in Honolulu.
"This gun is for killing Philippino motherfuckers," the soldier had said. "It kills one of those bastards so dead that you need two graves to bury him in."

A bit about what the war was like for the Filippinos:

"The scale of US achievement in pursuing it's "good intentions" can only be guessed. General James Bell, who commanded the operations in Southern Luzon, estimated in May 1901 that one sixth of the natives of Luzon had been killed or died from Dengue Fever, considered the result of war induced famine; thus, over 600,000 dead on this island alone. A US government report indicated the 3/4 of the population of 300,000 had been killed by the army or famine and disease in one province of Luzon, where Bell had been fighting. A Republican Congressman who visited the Philippines wrote that "You never hear of any disturbances in Northern Luzon...becuase there isn't anyone there to rebel...our soldiers took no prisoners; they kept no records; they simply swept the country and wherever and however they could get hold of a Filipino they killed him. The women and children were spared and may now be noticed in dispproportionate numbers on that part of the island."

Bell was, in fact, more mercifull than some:

"On the Island of Samar, in contrast, everyone over the age of 10 was ordered killed by Waller's comander General Smith, who was "admonished" in a court-martial proceeding and retired a year and a half early by President Roosevelt, in punshment." - Noam Chomsky, "Turning the Tide" (South End Press, 1985, page 88) quoting, in turn, from Daniel B. Schirmer, "Republic or Empire" (Schenkman, 1972, pp 231, 236-9 )

That's a lot of killing.
posted by troutfishing at 9:07 AM on January 29, 2003

But seriously: can we really believe that a certified "alternative lifestyle" like the Village Voice will report accurately on anything army-related? Think about it.

If you have some information that disproves or shows an inaccuracy in what was reported, then provide it. Otherwise, your comment doesn't make much sense, and is pretty much as banal as " cuban cigars are wonderful. Very smooth, and expertly rolled" as reaction to the post.
posted by fold_and_mutilate at 10:41 AM on January 29, 2003

"Finally, it should be the earnest wish and paramount aim of the military administration to win the confidence, respect, and affection of the inhabitants of the Philippines by assuring them in every possible way that full measure of individual rights and liberties which is the heritage of free peoples, and by proving to them that the mission of the United States is one of benevolent assimilation substituting the mild sway of justice and right for arbitrary rule." - Pres. McKinley [*]

"We can make them as free as ourselves, give them a government and country of their own, put a miniature of the American constitution afloat in the Pacific... It seemed to me a great task to which had addressed ourselves. But I have thought some more, since then, and I have read carefully the treaty of Paris, and I have seen that we do not intend to free, but to subjugate the people of the Phillippines. We have gone there to conquer, not to redeem. . . It should, it seems to me, be our pleasure and duty to make those people free, and let them deal with their own domestic questions in their own way. And so I am an anti-imperialist. I am opposed to having the eagle put its talons on any other land." - Mark Twain [*]

Ellis G. Davis, Company A, 20th Kansas:
"They will never surrender until their whole race is exterminated. They are fighting for a good cause, and the Americans should be the last of all nations to transgress upon such rights. Their independence is dearer to them than life, as ours was in years gone by, and is today." [*]
posted by eddydamascene at 12:47 PM on January 29, 2003

The Philippine Republic established by Emilio Aguinaldo was not exactly a bright alternative to American colonization.

Aguinaldo himself had achieved his position by executing the founder of the KKK (no, not that one, the Katipunan, the rebels against Spanish rule), Andres Bonifacio. He also settled for a sum of money to exile himself to Hong Kong and quite nicely while the US put down the "insurrection."

Rock. Hard place.
posted by linux at 2:40 PM on January 29, 2003

Rock. Hard place.

What bollocks. What does it matter what the alternative would have been? The US would have gone in regardless and their intentions were as dirty as those of the Spanish and the Japanese.
posted by lia at 10:08 PM on January 29, 2003

Linux - a bulletproof excuse for the slaughter of over 1 million by US troops, no doubt. You go, righteous dude: here's your license to massacre. Give my regards to Uncle Joe, too.
posted by troutfishing at 11:33 PM on January 29, 2003