We are busy with our lives. It's Fall in the Northeast and the the colors are beautiful. People travel here to see the foliage and we are safe and secure. One picks up the NY Times (or scans it online) and sees this stuff about Blackwater. NY Times Wednesday, Oct. 2 It is outrageous. American mercenaries who make $1000 per day to act with impunity like Rambos in a foreign land. There's another piece about the congressional investigation: Chief of Blackwater Defends His Employees Started by people from the families of prominent Republican fundraisers. Blackwater's CEO and Founder, Erik D. Prince, is a dark character cut from an ultraconservative right wing mold. People like him are coloring America's image in the Middle East.
Something is rotten here. The forward to "Imperial Life in the Emerald City" by Rajiv Chandrasekaran has this quote from T.E. Lawrence, who a century ago had watched the British try to transform the Middle East:
“Do not try to do too much with your own hands. Better the Arabs do it tolerably than you do it perfectly. It is their war, and you are there to help them, not win it for them. Actually, also, under the very odd conditions of Arabia, your practical work will not be as good as, perhaps, you think it is.”
American mercenaries in a foreign land. Kicking ass. Scary and outrageous. "Imperial Life" says it all and is a must read for anyone who has the time and interest. We are reading it in the Audible.com version.