POSTED RESPONSES TO A COLUMN IN TORONTO'S GLOBE AND MAIL
Obama has called the recent incident a “systematic failure” of intelligence.
What else was the original 9/11 attack but a "systemic failure"?
What else was the assassination of John Kennedy but a "systemic failure"?
During the Cold War, it is a legendary fact that CIA's estimates of the Soviet Union were consistently failed.
The CIA didn't even forecast the final collapse of the Soviet Union.
America's bloated intelligence agencies have never been effective.
Big Intelligence simply does not work.
But they sure can eat resources and make things miserable for ordinary people.
And the good old CIA sure knows how to torture people.
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Readers may enjoy my piece of a few years ago, "Why The CIA Will Always Be A Costly Flop."
You'll find it at:
http://chuckmanwords.wordpress.com/2009/05/31/why-the-cia-always-will-be-a-costly-flop/
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"A senior taliban leader in Pakistan stated, very clearly, that islam and democracy are incompatible. Muslims do not need democracy, as the koran should be used as an example of how a muslim should live his life.
"Notice that it's 'his' life, as a woman has no standing in muslim society and is only a commodity"
This person should know the words to the music before getting up to sing.
What a complete load of uninformed nonsense he/she has written, contributing only to the huge pile of propaganda and ignorance we see about Muslims.
Those statements apply precisely to economically backward societies always and everywhere.
Women were commodities in Europe only a few centuries ago.
Wealthy men can today still buy a wife in India.
Indeed, the practice of “bride burning” is still common in India.
Twelve year old girls are often married off to wealthy old men making payments to the “bride’s” family. Then when she is a widow at a very young age, she is treated like a social outcast and must conform to many terrible rules of behavior. Her life is as good as over. Millions are affected this way.
Women in Africa, to the tune of 3 million a year, suffer the horrors of genital mutilation. And in many parts of Africa, young girls are routinely raped by older village men.
Women in Canada could not have bank accounts without their husband’s written permission well into the 20th century.
Democracy is incompatible with all old societies. It took the United States two hundred years AFTER its revolution to achieve something even vaguely close to democracy.
It is estimated that about 1% of the population of Virginia could vote. Even white males could not vote because of property requirements.
The Senate wasn’t even elected until 1913.
Women couldn’t vote until 1920.
Great masses of black people couldn’t vote until the 1960s.
And today, because of an outdated, anti-democratic provision of the Constitution, Americans still do not directly elect their president: this has produced a number of minority presidents plus a number of political farces like the 2000 election.
