Photo leak -- intentional?

I caught a bit of CNN on my television before work yesterday morning. A reporter was interviewing some pitiful meathead who lives in the hometown of one of the soldiers on trial for the S&M Iraqi prisoner shenanigans.

I paraphrase what he said to the camera:

"I don't know why he's (the soldier on trial) in trouble. They (Iraqi insurgents) killed our people, dragged 'em through the streets, and hung 'em up. We're at war, you know. Why should they be able to do that to us and we have to treat them with respect?"

I knew it would come to this, even before Rush Limbowel made his comment that the soldiers were simply "blowing off steam." Indeed, when you've demonized and dehumanized an entire country (or region) -- which is what war does, by definition -- why shouldn't we electrocute them and force them to wear panties on their faces for our amusement? Why shouldn't we hogtie them and fuck them in the ass with glowsticks? Shit, I'll bet more glowsticks have been stuck in assholes at Burning Man than in Abu Ghraib.

And let's pretend, just for shits and giggles, that we're a clique of racist, power-obsessed, reptilian-brained Neo-Nazi-cons who are determined to create a new world war -- perhaps to make a ton of money for our military/industrial complex pals, or maybe to hasten the return of Jesus H. Christ himself, or simply because we get hard-ons killing brown skinned non-Xtians and sacrificing rednecks to Moloch. If we really wanted to inflame an entire region -- nay, an entire world full of Muslims -- into fanatical hatred, wouldn't the cleverly orchestrated leak of torture photos serve our agenda ever-so-well? Want to get every red-blooded Arab man and boy to sign up for jihad? Show them faceless photos of Arab men and boyz naked, humiliated, hog-tied, and homosexualized -- the Arab Everyman as S&M boy toy of some West Virginia Army skank smoking a Marlboro and giving a thumbs-up to the camera. Presto! Instant world war.

Perhaps I'm to conspiratorial, and perhaps the Neo-Con cabal is just made up of doddering idiots who didn't realize Seymour Hersh was going to spill the beans. But it's all far too perfectly plotted. Peak oil is here, it's the end of a all-or-nothing game of Risk, and the last rolls of the dice are being made. The final grab for the final puddles of oil
are underway. Unfortunately, control of all the remaining puddles requires WWIII. Yesiree, it requires the fall of (or Western co-optation of) Syria, Iran, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, Libya (already happened).... and so forth. And Russia. And China.

BushCo. knew the torture was happening, and encouraged it. They knew photos would leak, and probably encouraged that, too. It worked. The entire Arab world is convinced the U.S. is out to get them. And guess what? It's true!

Ah, screw this negative ranting -- I'm going to get me an adult Happy Meal.