Merkavah - Drive the Lord's SUV!

So... after dinner today, I stopped by at the Abstentions... our little in-residence convenience store, to check out what insane mags they might be carrying. Last I checked, there were several copies of Trump magazine, but they were no longer there.

A shame, really, since I actually wanted to pick up a copy and take a closer look at the life of these insanely rich buggers and their trophy wives.

While that's one side of right-winged buggery (and I was just discussing earlier with some friends at the hypocrisy of both sides of the political spectrum... how few left-wingers had any clue of what they were talking about when they talked about military strategy and hardware, and how few right-wingers knew when they talked about social policy... or even how to manage money in a non-business model)... I somehow managed to pick up a copy of the March editions of Soldier of Fortune magazine at a campus store.

Coke, Commies, and "Capitalism"?

This publication is literally insane. While I oftentimes respect the common soldier (and moreso, manytimes, the romanticised mercenaries of the cold-war era), the nature of this publication itself is to praise and perfect the act of killing, to dehumanize those that they are killing, and to give them some sort of moral high ground. Excessive amounts of moral high ground.

Which makes sense, sort of. You don't want soldiers feeling bad about what they're doing, because then they'll get shot. But when the war itself is for unjustifiable purposes... this just passes off as propaganda. And they make sordid remarks about journalists being huge sensationalists... and while that is true... true to their own nature, the Soldier of Fortune magazine is far worse.

The articles themselves are really poorly written. Not surprising, given the amount of hatred they have for journalists for never telling the happy, heroic stories... of which Soldier Of Fortune has few. Every page has the words "Support Our Troops!" emblazoned down at the bottom of the page. Some of the articles are of hero stories... but moreso... gear suggestions for returning troops. (and for the other nutjobs who buy the mag just because they think they're commandos) In a certain light, they aren't all bad. They do try the best for the troops themselves by giving them suggestions for the best gear and thereby pawning off their shit. The hero stories are poorly written, but of decent quality. One of the articles actually comes close to passing, in my eyes, un-biased journalism. Of course... the other articles are also ridiculously de-humanizing, rendering a picture of Arabs as heartless, brainless rag-heads. In a way, it also dehumanizes the American soldiers themselves, because while I am aware that a great many of them acknowledge killing in war to be a necessity, the magazine treats killing like a sport... rather like game-hunting.

"Busy Killing The Enemy: Miami's Mad Max Marines Finale" is an example of the title of an article. While it says enough on its own, I will include Caroline's opinion: "This is like, testosterone on paper."

The advertisements are ridiculous. If they're not ads for training manuals for the common civilian to become killing machines (obviously geared towards the aforementioned nutjobs), they're ads for weaponary. I can understand an ad for an ArmaLite AR-50 .338 Lapua rifle... I really can... but an ad for a 'Carbon Black Titanium CarboNitride' finished knife with the words "9/11 We Will Never Forget" across the blade? Wait... lemme think... I think this knife was made for people who've watched just a little too much Rambo. Am I wrong?

Or bullets... advertised with the tagline "The World's Premier Anti-Terrorist Rounds!" or also on the same ad... "You Shall Rise Up on the Wings of Eagles.. and the Gates of Hell Shall Not Prevail Against You!"... wait... those bullets can't be used to shoot anything but terrorists? Are they... holy warrior bullets... or what? I don't get it. And the second line...

Apparently, moral high ground also involves religion. Because Christianity is just... oh so superior to those uncultured Arab pigs. And they say this isn't a religious war. There's an image in here of a soldier praying at his bed (to an American flag... no less)... I don't know how much more religious it can get.

*le sigh*

Oh, and I mention that there are still a good number of articles here about Vietnam? Wait... how long has it been, exactly?

I'm fucking tired. I'm going to take a nap. This magazine is ridiculous. While I realize it is originally a magazine for mercs, it now looks to profit off the crazy pissed off rednecks riled up by the terrorist 'threat'... guys who just want to go grab some hardware and go fucking crazy-go-nuts. Only one or two articles actually showed reverence for the common soldier... the others tried to either justify the war (and push some political bullcrap), or sell something. More of the latter, actually.

P.S. I was reminded earlier today of a statement from someone that this war was unique in that it resulted from an event which caused a huge butt-load of hatred... and that it was a war about just that... hatred. I differ in opinion, citing the US involvement against Japan post-Pearl Harbor. Just an observation.

P.P.S. My friend Mike Giacoma (who is my right-winged right-hand man, by the way) and I were discussing a specific article which extols that the gear soldiers have is sufficient (which is contrary to what the rest of the mag has been screaming... whilst trying to pitch products in their faces...) and he made a point about the article discussing armour additions to the Humvee... and how, while the article uses it as an example of how troops got what they really needed, it really just destroys the mobility of the vehicle and thus lessens the ability of the Humvee to go anywhere fast... especially when they need to be moving along before they get tagged by an RPG. To quote his quote of a 1st Armoured member: "Speed Is Life"