Here we go again
Upon taking office in 2021, President Biden proudly proclaimed to the nation, “America’s back!” Sadly, little did the public realize that the White House — with rabid jingoistic GOP support — is bringing America back to its long sordid history of Cold War saber-rattling and inflating fictitious foreign threats (in order to promote the domestic arms industry?).
Who can forget that in 2003, the U.S. went to war in Iraq based on an outrageous lie, that Saddam Hussein had WMDs (weapons of mass destruction), ready to be launched on mere 90 minutes of notice?
That gigantic fish tale had no evidence, but it was sold in such melodramatic tones that the mainstream media (MSM) bought it line, hook and sinker. The MSM not only blindly parroted Uncle Sam’s narrative with relish, but in many instances even embellished it hyperbolically (the reporting by Judith Miller of the N.Y. Times is only one of many such egregious examples of near-cheerleading for that illegal war!)
Today, 19 years later, the U.S. government is rolling out the same “cry wolf” tale of a hyped-up “imminent Russian invasion of Ukraine.” But the false narrative has holes so big that one can easily drive an M-60 tank right through them.
When State Department spokesman Ned Price (an ex-CIA operative) was asked by a reporter to provide proof of his claimed “Russian false-flag” operation, he not only provided no solid evidence but actually accused the journalist as being a Kremlin dupe! Even Ukrainian President Zelensky has to publicly rebuke Washington’s extreme war hype for causing undue public panic and even scaring away the flow of foreign tourists into his country!
If America’s bipartisan ruling elite truly wants to bring America back, perhaps they should start by transferring the hundreds of billions of dollars in the bloated war budget back to universal health care, creating tens of millions of civilian jobs with good pay, and put a serious down payment on renewable energy and other green infrastructures to deal with the real threat of climate change.
Now, that would be a true Green Deal that might just unite the red and blue warring factions in these United States?
Peace, aloha and imua!
Danny H.C. Li
Keaau
Bad idea
Once again, a really bad idea has raised its head, this time in the county “Covering costs” ideas (Tribune-Herald, Feb. 13). This is to charge fees for people to dump household trash.
I witnessed the outcome of such a policy years ago when I lived on the mainland doing desert ecological research east of Palm Springs, Calif. I accessed my study area off a remote dirt road along a power line. The road connected to a paved road serving a county landfill.
Suddenly one season, the power line road was strewn with garbage bags and loose household trash. I then learned the landfill had started charging fees for people to dump household garbage.
If Hawaii County imposes fees for people to dump household trash, all the remote roads on the Big Island will become an extended and dispersed landfill, just like the desert east of Palm Springs did.
William Mautz
Kurtistown
