America's Endless Wars

Glenn Greenwald has a couple of good pieces on America's endless wars. One talks about how critics should "just shut up" and why:

Beyond the desire to render democratic opinion irrelevant, there is another, more specific reason why war advocates so frequently insist that critics should "shut up": because the policies they are implementing are so ludicrous and indefensible and redound to the benefit of a tiny sliver of the population. They can't be sustained if there is debate and examination over them.

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This state of Endless War continues despite the fact that, as a new poll shows, 72% of Americans believe the U.S. is fighting too many wars. The poll itself is revealingly amusing: in what other country could that question -- are we fighting too many wars? -- even be meaningfully asked?

And the other looks at some recent disheartening events:

As usual, there are multiple events from just the last 24 hours vividly highlighting the nature of America's ongoing -- and escalating -- posture of Endless War: ... So even under the most "aggressive" withdrawal plan the President is considering -- one that he and media outlets will undoubtedly tout as a "withdrawal plan" (the headline on the NYT front page today: "Obama to Announce Plans for Afghan Pullout") -- there will still be "twice the number" of American troops in that country as there were when George Bush left office and Obama was inaugurated.

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The war in Libya is starting to resemble virtually every other war: commenced with claimed humanitarian justifications; supported by well-meaning people convinced by the stated, official objectives; hailed as a short and easy task ("days, not weeks"); and then warped into a bloody, protracted conflict far from the original claims and without any real end in sight.

Read them - and be prepared to get angry. Again.