Many Americans are likely to have to work until they are dead, not as a result of Social Security shortfalls but because of their inadequate... Jane White http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jane-white/

An evolving practice in Republican House campaigns against Democratic candidates is the use of Islamophobia: spreading the idea that there is a domestic terrorism threat from Muslims, and that the GOP can better protect the public from "the other."

Drawing on FOX News outlets, talk radio, suspect websites in the blogosphere--and real events such as the controversy over the prospective building of a mosque near Ground Zero--Republican House campaigns are becoming adept at transforming factoids and rumors in non-mainstream channels into reported "facts" in local mainstream media. One glaring example is found in the 9th Congressional District of North Carolina, represented by one of the most conservative members of the House and tea party caucus member, Sue Myrick. It includes the largest city in the state.

A Charlotte Observer editorial of August 18--Cynical Pols Playing with Religious Hatred--commendably criticized former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich for taking note of how many Americans harbor hostile feelings toward Muslims, and then finding political traction in riding the bandwagon of peddling religious paranoia, fear and hatred. Remarkably absent from the indictment, however, was the local Congresswoman, Rep. Myrick, who has represented a safe Republican district for 16 years.

Yet, she has repeatedly committed essentially the same Gingrich political trick, as evidenced by a trail of front-page stories in the largest paper in the Carolinas since the beginning of this election year. The latest example: Myrick: 'Homegrown' Terrorists are Working Within U.S, August 25. She sounded an alarm that she often repeats before local chambers of commerce, Republican women gatherings, and "town hall" meetings held in her district offices. These forums provide protective political cover; sometimes security guard "types" are hanging around.

HOW the CARD is PLAYED

Two months ago, in Myrick Calls for Look into Terrorists on S.W. Border: Congresswoman Believes Hezbollah is in Mexico, June 30, it was reported that the representative had asserted in a letter to the secretary of Homeland Security, Janet Napolitano: I believe Hezbollah and the drug cartels may be operating as partners on our border. That department's spokesman replied that the U.S. does not have any credible information on terrorist groups operating along the Southwest border.

In a cozy July 14 interview with Brian Kilmeade of Fox News--watched by this writer--Myrick, a member of the House Intelligence Committee, indicated that she had thus far refused the offer of an "intelligence briefing" on the alleged border threat because she did not want to be bound by secrecy. (A few days later, that portion of the interview had been elided from the clip!) She elaborated on her theory:

It really bothers me because here we are with a porous border, not really paying attention to who is coming over, what's happening with Iran and Hugo Chavez and Venezuela. We know that there are people going to Venezuela learning Spanish and then coming up through Mexico with fake documents trying to cross the border.

TATTOED HEZBOLLAH AGENTS in MEXICO?

Playing the xenophobic card has become part of Myrick's standard repertoire in sounding the alarm over the threat of terrorism at home with: a) dated tales of Hezbollah operatives with tattoos (in Farsi) crossing the Mexican border; or b) headline-grabbing use of resuscitated old news reports about a local al-Qaeda contact now living in Yemen. (Myrick: U.S. Failed to Halt Area Jihadist, July 2; an oversight extending back several years into the previous administration, incidentally.) In the process, of course, she exploits her membership on the Intelligence Committee--which she became a member of only last year--while broadly criticizing the "intelligence community" in Washington. She has even called for a probe of Muslim intern "spies"
working for members of Congress.

COVERT OPERATIONS

Does she really believe the national intelligence directorate would permit Hezbollah terrorists to roam and cross the southern border of the continental United States? Maybe this freshman member of the House Intelligence Committee is denied "compartmented" intelligence about the potentially extralegal, multi-agency anti-terrorist "strike" squads that the U.S. covertly deploys in several foreign countries to subdue or kill (terminate with extreme prejudice) the enemy. They are not limited to Yemen or Somalia. She could have found out this "black arts" secret by closely reading the New York Times and the Washington Post, starting with the landmark Top Secret America series--under Special Operations--that ran in the Post this summer. topsecretamerica@washpost.com

[Vide: Unconventional warfare or "SWAT" like non-military operations, including Air Force special tactics, Army special forces (Green Berets) and Rangers, Marine Corps special operations, Navy special warfare, including SEALs (sea-air-land); combat search and rescue; the specialized military-like organizations of the CIA, DEA, FBI, ICE, and other civil agencies; and the clandestine units and functions of the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC).]

WASHINGTON RULES

So what is Rep. Myrick's purpose, other than to opportunistically spread fear and suspicion for political gain? Does she have any fresh information from credible sources? If she in fact learned of domestic terrorism dangers from top secret Intelligence Committee briefings and is now talking about them publicly, she is in serious violation of House rules, subject to reprimand if not expulsion. (Quote: This is not something I'm making up.)

If she recently received such information from a former intelligence agent or, say, a private detective--or even a fringe website--why did she not summon the DNI (director of national intelligence) or CIA or FBI directors before her oversight committee and demand answers? (Quote in re the case of a former community college student, Samir Khan: The intelligence community should have been able to discover that. And if they knew it and didn't do something, that raises more red flags.) Or, why did she not simply notify the FBI?

There are some real disconnects in Sue Myrick's spun tales, unless perchance she is trying to eat her cake and have it, too. She lambastes the intelligence agencies--offering no new evidence from her own sources--while running around like Chicken Little shouting in effect nobody will tell you these things or nothing is being done. And she gets the ride she hopes for in local mainstream media, such as on the local CBS affiliate, WBTV. Hardline Anchor Molly Grantham has often conducted embarrassingly subservient, softball interviews--as if taping a campaign commercial--with the Congresswoman on the danger of terrorists on the home front:

"They aren't doing anything, illegal," says Myrick.

"But they know that, don't they?" asked Grantham.

"Yes they do."

"They walk the fine line."

"They do," Myrick agreed.

"And they use our Constitution against us?"

"Yes," said Myrick, "They use our Constitution against us and they know just how far they can go."

[In the interest of full disclosure: In 1996, I unsuccessfully ran in the 9th C. D. Democratic primary for the nomination to oppose Rep. Myrick.]

One woman attempts to make citizen’s arrest on Blair ‘for war crimes committed in Iraq’.

More: continued here

Popstar Lady GaGa is reportedly training to become an ordained minister in order to perform gay marriages for her LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered) fans. According to British tabloid, the Daily Star, the bisexual singer has been spurred on by the continuing row over gay marriages in California.

Both she and Boxer need more debates. The voters need more too.

Political rookie Carly Fiorina should book every televised debate with U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer that the senator will permit.

Obsessing about extremists and conspiracy theories, on the right and on the left, is often a way for the elites to gloss over their own failures.

More: continued here

President Obama's National Economic Adviser Lawrence Summers has just landed in Beijing along with Deputy National Security Adviser Tom Donilon, Asia Desk NSC senior director Jeff Bader, and National Security Council Spokesman Michael Hammer. The China Daily reports this morning:

The arrival of two high-ranking US officials in Beijing [it's really four] on Sunday signals the willingness of the two countries to push for more positive development in bilateral ties. . .A timely exchange of views on core issues of mutual concern is conducive to effective cooperation as well as to ironing out differences and hurdles standing in the way of ties between the two big towers. The talks between the US officials and their Chinese hosts are widely expected to address bilateral trade as well as global and regional security.

All good. It's important for US officials to get over to breathe the air, meet the people, and see the furious digging and construction going on all over China. While Summers has been to China, I think [and could be wrong] that this is Tom Donilon's first trip. He needs more than four days -- but he's an intense workaholic, so four is more like ten.

One of the things that I'd be worried about if I were them is that the Chinese are learning the American secret of reserve currency magic in their management of the mooncake market.

Like the U.S. dollar -- which despite the global frustration with American economic policy, over-consumption and under-investment -- Chinese mooncakes, or the idea of them, are in huge demand.

When the season hits, everyone in China -- which is a fifth of the world's population -- wants their slice of the mooncake racket.

Not to eat, mind you, but to give and get and re-gift and re-gift and to pretend to want.

The French have a "French national mooncake" (pictured on bus above) to build on the popularity of the France Pavilion and Moet Hennesy Restaurant at the Shanghai World Expo. The French Pavilion is France's most visited tour attraction in the world -- more than the Louvre and Eiffel Tower. France's mooncake has the three colors of the flag, but their are a couple of Chinese blogger sites warning "not to eat" it. Well, from my discussions, it seems that most mooncakes are more seen than eaten anyway.

Haagen-Dazs has a mooncake -- and Starbucks. And of course, just about every Chinese establishment has some version of a mooncake for purchase, for gifting, for shipping with notes of congratulations for making it to another mooncake season.

But like any currency that takes the place of gold or silver or other commodities that used to underlie the solvency of national legal tender, the mooncake business has generated a currency of vouchers -- where instead of just giving and getting mooncakes, families can give and get "mooncake vouchers." Paper. . .for mooncakes.

The notable phenom, however, is that some Chinese government officials and senior Party leaders have observed that there are many more mooncake vouchers floating around then there are mooncakes connected to them -- and yet the voucher business is thriving, trading is going on. In fact, it's reaching such a frenzy that some are wondering whether or not that many mooncakes even really need to be cooked up.

Production seems unrelated to demand.

Mooncake vouchers are beginning to develop all of the characteristics of a new reserve currency, not yet globalized, but perhaps on its way -- given that mooncakes are big in Southeast Asia and possibly now in France.

There is an illogical trust in mooncake vouchers which seem to defy economic gravity and have great value despite their inflation far beyond the underlying dessert.

Chinese economic Mandarins are reportedly fed up with the dollar even though options out of the dollar are limited. Behind the scenes frustration with being trapped in the US dollar which is still buoyant but unpredictable led to rumors that the Chief of China's central bank was trying to escape the country and defect to Canada. These rumors proved to be untrue -- but many folks in Beijing and elsewhere wondered.

So, perhaps mooncake vouchers are a trial balloon -- part real bubble and part experiment -- in creating an institution with reverse currency power.

Everyone has to buy in to mooncake vouchers even though many folks don't really want the mooncakes themselves -- and for a few decades at least, one can continue to inflate and inflate further the number of vouchers without every having to pay the piper.

Larry Summers and Tom Donilon should be worried that the Chinese are going to make a play sooner than later to challenge the dollar's reserve currency status with their own home grown mooncake vouchers.

(Smile. I'm sure that there are many logical fallacies in what is above -- offered in fun.)

But still, Summers should investigate.

Hope you enjoyed the fun. And if you didn't -- eat some mooncake.

-- Steve Clemons publishes the popular political blog, The Washington Note. Clemons can be followed on Twitter @SCClemons

A Fox News poll released last week indicates the majority of Americans feel the Iraq war was a success. It also suggests they want to get past it and focus on other things. This is good and bad. It is good that average Americans can put our invasion of Iraq in 2003 out of their [...]

In an interview on the PBS NewsHour last Wednesday, Joe Biden was unwilling to contradict the official narrative of the Iraq War that Gen. David Petraeus and the Bush surge had turned Iraq into a good war after all. That interview serves as a reminder of just how completely the Democratic Party foreign policy elite [...]

Heard often at Dakota County Tech: 'Soccer brought me here'
Pioneer Press
It now has more than 30 clubs and organizations — from the Automotive Club to the Gay Straight Alliance — and four sports teams, not including the two set ...

and more »

A Muslim cultural center near ground zero that has unleashed a torrent of anti-Muslim sentiments and vandalism has many worried about their place.

More: continued here

On the Internet, Asian men can organize and meet sex or romantic partners. But its anonymity also provides the last frontier of open prejudice. The last part of our 3-part series examines the Net effect on gay anti-Asian prejudice--and suggests solutions.

New York Times Paranoid About Paranoia
New York Times
Consider the apparently widespread notion that George W. Bush knew about 9/11 in advance. If true, it would suggest that Bush was not merely a bad man or a …

and more »

More: continued here

Gay couples begin to find acceptance they crave in progressive faith communities
Duluth News Tribune
... as evidenced by early efforts to abolish slavery and church activists' subsequent battle to win civil rights for the nation's minorities. ...

and more »

On Labor Day 2010, we are short at least 25 million jobs. And just as importantly, we don't have enough jobs that pay decently.

The press last week was full of stories that the jobs picture was not as dismal as feared.

The economy is actually generating jobs again -- just not enough to make a dent in the backlog of 15 million Americans officially out of work and another 8 million with part time jobs seeking full time ones, and millions more out of the labor force entirely.

In the government's most recent report, released Friday, officially measured unemployment actually increased to 9.6 percent, just one tenth of a point below its rate last Labor Day.

The stock market rose on reports that we will avert a "double-dip" recession. Economic growth is still in positive territory. But the economy grew at a decent rate after the Great Depression bottomed out in 1933, as well. Nonetheless, unemployment remained stuck in double digits for the next seven years, until World War II.

As in the middle and late 1930s, economic growth is positive -- just not strong enough to create sufficient jobs. This, of course, is the lingering fallout from the financial collapse of 2008, just as persistent unemployment in the Depression was the legacy of the Crash of 1929.

But there is a larger story here that predates the recent financial collapse. The economy not only has a scarcity of jobs, but a shortage of good jobs. And while Republicans would resist legislating a serious public jobs program, the administration should fight for one anyway.

And there is plenty that government could do right now to improve jobs pay via executive powers.

One of those powers is government's role as a contractor. The other is to enforce laws already on the books that prohibit employers from stealing wages and that guarantee workers the right to join or organize unions.

The Obama administration has made some heartening steps in both directions, but it could do a great deal more.

Federal procurement, directly or indirectly, affects about one fourth of the jobs in the economy. In past administrations, government procurement was used as leverage to stop deeply entrenched patterns of racism in hiring and promotion. Before there were the votes in Congress to pass the great civil rights acts of the mid-1960s, Presidents Kennedy and Johnson used executive orders to require corporations bidding on federal contracts to end discriminatory practices.

And during World War II, President Roosevelt's War Labor Board required that companies with war production contracts have good labor relations -- which meant acceptance of unions when workers voted for them.

In the Obama administration, the Labor Department is getting an additional $25 million to better enforce wage and hour laws. And the Vice President's Task Force on Middle Class Working Families is doing important work, though with a tiny staff.

Obama, early in his term, issued four executive orders that mainly corrected for anti-labor orders by George W. Bush, but these do not take full advantage of the leverage that government has.

Today, President Obama could issue orders requiring that companies bidding on government contracts behave as decent employers. This would be the game-changer.

Unfortunately, companies that are flagrant union-busters, such as Fedex, still get billions in government work.

Corporations that routinely disguise permanent workers as temps or independent contractors, in order to reduce their wages and rights, are still on the approved list.

And contractors in agriculture that pay starvation wages and have appalling working conditions for farm workers still supply food products for the school lunch program and even for the Pentagon's MREs -- Meals Ready to Eat -- for America's service men and women.

The American Prospect has just published a special report on all the things government could be doing -- without new legislation -- to turn bad jobs into decent ones.

The high rate of joblessness has gotten nearly all the attention. But the declining quality and pay of most jobs is every bit as big a problem.

Wages, adjusted for inflation, have barely risen in three decades, while productivity has doubled. Nearly all of the gains have gone to the very top.

Very high unemployment only exacerbated that trend, because it puts job-seekers into competition with one another for the available work, and undermines any remaining leverage for raises, a word we don't hear much lately.

Even before the recession started, in the period from 2000 to 2007, only about three percent of the workforce managed to increase their earnings adjusted for inflation.

The long term trend reflects an epic shift in the bargaining power of workers and managers. The causes are multiple.

Unions have been weakened by relentless union-busting by industry, while government has largely failed to enforce worker rights to organize or join unions under the Wagner Act.

Increased trade with countries that pursue predatory trade practices and that recognize no worker rights has undercut wages in the U.S.

Companies that once had tacit social compacts with their stakeholders now feel free to outsource work if someone else will do it cheaper.

Supposedly, education and training is the cure-all. But think about it. Back in the 1950s, when most Americans did not go to college and the average factory worker didn't finish high school, our income distribution was far more equal and we had a blue-collar middle class.

Today, tens of millions of college graduates are working at jobs that don't require a college degree. Some professions that require extensive education have had fairly flat earnings over the past decade.

Certainly we need a well educated workforce, but that by itself does not assure decent wages.

In the 1940s, '50s, and '60s, median wages and the economy's average productivity growth moved upwards in lockstep. The income distribution actually became more equal.

That trend had little to do with the fact that workers were becoming better educated -- and everything to do with the economy's "equalizing institutions." These included an effective labor movement, backed by government's commitment to enforce worker rights and to expand opportunities.

President Obama is in political trouble today because people are anxious about both their jobs and their paychecks. He could help himself and all working Americans by moving more boldly on both fronts.

Robert Kuttner's new book is A Presidency in Peril. He is co-editor of The American Prospect and a Senior Fellow at Demos.

CBS News American Muslims Ask, Will We Ever Belong?
New York Times
It is too soon to tell whether hate crimes against Muslims are rising or are on pace with previous years, experts said. But it is possible that other …
Times to City: Drop DeadWall Street Journal
United States: Behind anti-Muslim hysteriaGreen Left Weekly

all 568 news articles »

More: continued here

There's 13 Democratic-held Senate seats, and about 80 House seats, from which we could see Democrats lose their majority. About how many of those endangered incumbents are laying the truth on the line for all to see?

The problem of course starts with that many of them began this past cycle by voting against the truth, by bailing out the richest of Americans, 100 pennies to the dollar, on their losing bets. That's not the American way, its not capitalism, and all it really can be called is corporate welfare. I have no pity for those Democrats which voted for that when they lose in 2010.

I'm looking out for the truth-tellers, and hope to wishes that they don't get swept up in this calmaty of misplaced pririties by the Democratic majorities.

Here's one (via email):

Oil billionaire David Koch is spending $250,000 on attack ads against me this week. But I'm not the only one. In fact, he is deploying his polluting billions toward this modest goal:

Choosing our next government.

In more than 50 Congressional races across the country, in the next two months, Koch will be spending $45 million. To give you an idea of how much money that is, the total amount of all PAC contributions to all candidates so far is roughly $200 million.

And much of the money that Koch is using in this attempted leveraged buyout of our Government comes from . . . you and me.

For many years, Koch had a contract to extract oil from federal and Indian lands. In return, Koch was supposed to pay a royalty. A jury found that Koch underpaid the Government by $210 million.

Media Matters says that Koch has received $100 million in government contracts in the last ten years alone.

And Koch has paid for his assault on progressive government during the past decade largely with tax-deductible, tax-free foundation money:

* $120 million from the "David H. Koch Charitable Foundation,"
* $48 million from the "Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation," and
* $28 million from the "Claude R. Lambe Charitable Foundation," Charles Koch controls.

So there you have it. It's the taxpayers who have inadvertently underwritten the Koch assault on social services, a clean environment and good government.

From time to time, we will keep you posted about the Koch scheme to dictate who wins and who loses elections in America. In the meantime, thank you for your support for clean government. And special thanks to the 1000+ supporters who answered the call, and made a contribution to help us fight back.

Truth,

Alan Grayson

Other than Alan Grayson & Russ Feingold, among those 13 and 80, who has told the truth by their words and actions?

Yea, they will lose elections, but we are going to pay.

Orange mayor's race: Stance on gay rights could sway some votes
Orlando Sentinel
But the candidates' stances on social issues, namely gay civil rights, could also play a role in who wins the nonpartisan election Nov. 2. ...

If the past is prologue, what can we say about the future of American jobs this Labor Day? Rosy is not a term that comes to mind.

Over the last 30 years we have seen workers' wages remain essentially flat while worker productivity skyrocketed by 75 percent. The Economic Policy Institute refers to this phenomenon as a "broad-based collapse of wage growth." For three decades, American workers have been producing more, but taking home paychecks that don't reflect their hard work. Consequently, we see the biggest pay gap in nearly a century.

If this trend holds for another 30 years, a grim future awaits the next generation of American workers.

But low-wage jobs don't have to be our future, and a new national poll conducted by Lake Research for the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union (UFCW) shows that American voters want economic policies that address these inequities and seek to level the playing field for all Americans. Voters have a clear vision of what kind of economy they want. Voters understand the current economic situation is difficult, but they still believe that all jobs should pay a living wage, come with affordable, quality health care, and offer real retirement security. The poll, taken among 700 randomly-selected registered voters nationwide, shows:

1. Eighty-seven percent of voters are very or somewhat concerned that America's future jobs will be low wage and low benefit -- including 65% who are very concerned
2. Eighty-nine percent of voters agree that economic development should result in jobs with good wages and benefits that can support a family
3. Eighty-four percent of voters agree that economic recovery means creating jobs with good benefits so people can afford to take care of their families, not low wage jobs with no benefits
4. Eighty-four percent of voters favor requiring that government contracts go to companies that provide good paying jobs and benefits so that their employees don't end up on welfare programs like Medicaid and food stamps

At some point, we may see the restoration of high-paying manufacturing jobs, but in order to make jobs better for Americans now, we must look to the retail industry where immediate job growth will occur. A recent Department of Labor study confirms that the service sector will see the greatest job growth in the next decade. That means jobs for cashiers, clerks, and salespeople, among other service-sector positions.

Unfortunately, Walmart provides the predominant model for retail jobs today. Companies like Walmart pay low wages and benefits, and provide mostly part-time jobs--practices that lower standards for all retail workers. These companies claim that retail jobs should be "starter jobs," or "temporary jobs," when in reality these jobs are the future of our economy, and already employ millions of Americans of all ages, educational levels, and economic backgrounds. The number one job in America, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, is retail salesperson--a position held by some 4.2 million people as of May 2009.

Most of the 1.3 million UFCW members work in the retail industry: at grocery stores, retail clothing stores, or other retail jobs. They know firsthand that union retail jobs can be stable, middle-class jobs--the kind that come with affordable, quality health care, wages that pay the bills, and real retirement security. But the vast majority of the growing retail workforce is non-union, making it more and more difficult for union members to raise wages and benefits throughout the industry. And the economy is only making things more difficult. As the New York Times noted recently:

With the country focused on job growth and with unemployment continuing to hover above 9 percent, comparatively little attention has been paid to the quality of the jobs being created and what that might say about the opportunities available to workers when the recession finally settles. There are reasons for concern, however, even in the early stages of a tentative recovery that now appears to be barely wheezing along.

For years, long before the recession began, job growth had become increasingly polarized in this country. High-paid occupations that require significant amounts of education and training grew rapidly alongside low-wage, service-type jobs that do not, according to David Autor, a labor economist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology...The recession appears to have magnified that trend...

We can't let this trend continue. It's up to all of us, workers, shoppers, community members, and political leaders, to ensure that economic policies provide the opportunity to make all retail jobs good, career jobs. According to the Lake poll, a majority of voters believe job growth must be good job growth. In a number of polls Lake Research has found that a key economic frame for Americans is to have good-paying job no matter what the sector. To make that happen we must actively engage in the policy decisions that guide economic growth and job creation, and we must correct the current wage gap so that as worker productivity increases paychecks also increase.

The future of work, and the future of America, is in our hands. Clearly, American voters want and expect good jobs -- the kind that will keep families secure and America strong and competitive. If retail jobs are going to be a crucial part of America's future, then retail jobs need to be the kind of jobs that support American families and communities. They must be the kind of jobs that Americans can be proud to work at -- the kind that give more of us a shot at the American Dream.

Nadia McCaffrey, who lives in Tracy, CA, knows the pain that most parents can only think of in fleeting terms. The magnitude of the loss is too great to even contemplate.

Six years ago, Sergeant Patrick McCaffrey, Nadia's only child, was killed in Iraq. Tracy also possesses the highest per capita number of Iraq and Afghanistan war deaths in California.

It was reported this week that McCaffrey welcomed President Obama's address formally announcing combat troop drawdown in Iraq. She has started a non-profit in her son's name taking in vets suffering from post-traumatic stress and other injuries.

I wonder how McCaffrey feels about the piece recently written by Stanford professor and former New York Times Pulitzer Prize winning correspondent, Joel Brinkley, about Pashtun sexuality, which takes its name from a social science report sponsored by the Defense Department.

Brinkley wrote:
"For centuries, Afghan men have taken boys, roughly 9 to 15 years old, as lovers. Some research suggests that half the Pashtun tribal members in Kandahar and other southern towns are bacha baz, the term for an older man with a boy lover. Literally it means "boy player." The men like to boast about it.

'Having a boy has become a custom for us,' Enayatullah, a 42-year-old in Baghlan province, told a Reuters reporter. 'Whoever wants to show off should have a boy.'"

In Kandahar, weekly dance parties are a popular pastime. According Brinkley, "Young boys dress up as girls, wearing makeup and bells on their feet, and dance for a dozen or more leering middle-aged men who throw money at them and then take them home." A recent State Department report called "dancing boys" a "widespread, culturally sanctioned form of male rape."

Brinkley's article was difficult to read in a single sitting. He writes of a phenomenon in Afghanistan that is much older than American democracy, and much more entrenched in the largest sector of the country's population.

Is this why we're sending men and women to Afghanistan?

Moreover, the Defense Department reported many of the Pashtun men who have young boys as sexual partner continue this practice after the men marry.

Politically speaking, the Pashtun are key to any of the United States' preferred outcomes. The leadership of the Afghanistan government is Pashtun, including President Hamid Karzai. It is likely that whoever succeeds Karzai would also be Pashtun.

Pashtun pedophilia is only one problem among many for the United States in Afghanistan. Karzai is, at best, a quasi ally, more reminiscent of former South Vietnam President Ngo Dinh Diem than Nelson Mandela.

The Afghan president recently fired a senior prosecutor because he failed to block corruption investigations of the Karzai government.

The initial reason for the invasion -- al-Qaeda -- no longer exists. CIA Director Leon Panetta issued a report in June stating that there were no more than 50-100 members of al-Qaeda within Afghanistan.

Somewhere the Afghanistan mission changed. Winning in Afghanistan is not among the options available; and the preferred outcomes all include Pashtun involvement.

President Obama has already decided to double down on this effort, which looks more like the United States' perennial addictive behavior to commit militarily to nations that it knows very little about culturally.

And now there is the revelation that the population that we've hung our democratic hopes in Afghanistan -- assuming those hopes can be articulated -- is also engaged in systematic pedophilia. How can the president face a family whose son or daughter has made the ultimate sacrifice under such conditions?

I can accept different countries observe different customs. But I cannot accept that we must put our men and women in harm's way for those customs generally considered deplorable by the American people.

Who, why and what are we fighting in Afghanistan? Surely, this requires a presidential address from the Oval Office to the American people sooner rather than later.

Is this why we've asked our soldiers to shed blood? Is Pashtun liberation the reason we're demanding that our future generations sacrifice their treasure?

I'm sure that's not what Nadia McCaffrey has in mind when she's comes to the aid of veterans in the name of her fallen son.

Byron Williams is an Oakland pastor and syndicated columnist. He is the author of Strip Mall Patriotism: Moral Reflections of the Iraq War. E-mail him at byron@byronspeaks.com or visit his Web site byronspeaks.com