Most people in the U.S. only became very aware of Afghanistan after we entered into conflict within its boarders. That conflict, which became known as “Operation Enduring Freedom” or, the “O.E.F.” for short, seems to have spawned a lot of misconceptions about the country, its people and the prosecution of asymmetric warfare in general. I am convinced that understanding the nature of the country and our current conflict is crucial to the education of every American, regardless of their position in politics. If one lacks understanding, one is at the mercy of any politician or activist who wishes to lie. “Knowing is half the battle” as our G.I. Joe friends would say.
Here are a few of the most common myths associated with the cross roads of South-Asia.

Afghanistan has never been successfully occupied by a force of invasion.
This myth seems to be derived from the Soviet conflict of the 80’s. People who recall that conflict seem to make the assumption that if the might of the Soviet empire was repelled, then no army could withstand the hardened people and extreme weather and terrain of Afghanistan. In reality, Afghanistan has frequently been the subject of war and occupation even before its borders were officially defined in the 19th century. The most notable occupations were the invasions of the Mongols From roughly 1200 to 1500 AD, British and Russian influences over the country during the ‘great game’ of the 19th century and, of course, the conquest by various islamic groups whose influence can still be seen today. As a digression into the cultural trends of the country, centuries of war and occupation by external powers has created a general wariness of foreigners in the people of Afghanistan. This attitude is more prevalent among the most remote tribes but exists to some extent among the majority of the nation’s populace.

The U.S. Armed the Taliban and Bin Laden during the 80’s
The proximity of both the Taliban and Bin Laden to the Soviet conflict tend to fuel this myth. The truth is somewhat more interesting in my opinion. Firstly, the Taliban did not exist during the Soviet invasion, the group the U.S. Armed was the Mujhadieen. The Mujhadieen was a loose association of resistance factions and Afghani war lords with almost no centralized command and control structure. The decentralized nature of the Mujhadieen enhanced its effectiveness against the Soviet armies (who lacked experience fighting an asymmetric enemy on a large scale) but ultimately lead to conflict within its ranks. After the Soviet withdrawal, the Mujhadieen war lords began to fight amongst themselves for control of the country. As civil war broke out, the Taliban formed out of populace anger over the warlord fighting. The Taliban consisted of the most radical religious members in the country, its reign was marked by inhuman acts of violence such as genocide. Though the Taliban may have had control of some of the remnant weapons and equipment supplied by the U.S., the U.S. never directly aided the group.
The same myth about Bin Laden is more discernibly false. Bin Laden never belonged to the Mujhadieen. He instead belonged to the group known as the Maktab al-Kihdamat. Bin Laden’s philosophy was that the islamic world did not need the influence of the west to repel any invader. His group saw the invasion as an attack against islam and served to funnel in foreign jihad fighters and muslim finances into Afghanistan. Though the Maktab al-Kihdamat did take money from western sources, Bin Laden was never directly funded by any western country. He relied on his large inheritance to fund his resistance. Eventually, Bin laden would take some of the more radical members of the group to form Al-Qaeda, who’s philosophy concerning non-islamic entities reflected his own. (Their stated goal being to remove non-islamic powers from the “islamic lands” and to spread the reign of islam.)

No force of invasion has ever defeated a determined, insurgent resistance.

Warning: Angry editorial ranting to follow.
I cannot stand to hear this myth. It is incredibly ignorant. This particular myth actually inspired the writing on this subject. I was watching the Simpson when the character Lisa Simpson starts talking about the futility of fighting an insurgency. Remember in the opening paragraph when I said that ignorance on a subject can lead to your manipulation by an unscrupulous activist? This would be one of those times. The said thing is, plenty of people would here this joke and believe it. There are hundreds of examples of insurgencies failing. Insurgents usually lose their fights. Most notably because they are more poorly equipped and trained than their adversaries. Want a few examples? The Bay of Pigs , The U.S. Civil war, the Warsaw uprisings of WWII, Efforts for Indian independence from Britain in the 1940’s, various Native American uprisings. I could go on. Determined insurgencies have been defeated plenty of times. Just because you have a regional influence on a population does not necessarily mean you have a greater chance of wining.

So there you go. Three common myths about Afghanistan and insurgent fighting. I hoped you learned something. For instance, never take strategic military advice from the Simpsons. That is a life lesson that I think applies to us all.

Why won’t this show up?

I covered this in an earlier post, but I’m still pretty angry about it, so I’ll give it another go. You are killing the video game industry as we know it. Stop it.

DLC
Never, EVER buy DLC add-ons to console games. Many times, the DLC you’re buying is actually just a key that unlocks content on the disc you’ve already paid for. Other times, the DLC you’re buying was completed at the same time as the normal game. The developers CHOSE to leave those parts out of the game so that they could sell them to you later. By the time you get the game, most development studios have already moved on to new projects. In the rare case that the DLC is actually developed after the game is released, half the time the DLC was done by some unrelated developer, and what you’ve got is a haphazardly thrown together expansion. Any way you look at it, it’s bullshit. You’ve already bought the game, and upon doing so you should be entitled to experience everything the game has to offer. Video games are already too expensive, but if you buy a sixty dollar game and a ten dollar expansion the developer has already milked seventy dollars out of you. Buying DLC lets developers know that it’s okay to charge for it. Even if it’s just a five dollar little pack. You’re setting precedent. You’re giving them incentive to leave things out of the game intentionally so that they can sell them to you later. You’re letting them know that they don’t have to put all their effort into a game to get you to buy it. There have even been rumors all around the industry about game endings being DLC. That is the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard. That’s like buying a DVD, watching it for an hour and a half, and having to pay again for the last half an hour. There’s no excuse for it. But you can bet it’s going to happen if you keep buying DLC. You’re encouraging these developers to put less and less on that disc you paid sixty dollars for, and more and more in little ten dollar packages for you to download. You can’t reinforce this kind of behavior. Game developers are like bratty children. These men are running a business. If DLC remains successful, it’s going to grow and we’re going to suffer the consequences. If DLC fails, we’ll see less of it and benefit from that fact. Don’t confuse DLC with patches, though. Patches are good things, so long as they don’t charge for them. A patch can increase compatibility, correct technical errors, and add elements to games that the developer wanted to put in the first time, but screwed up in some way or another. Patches show that developers care about the experience you take away from a game. It shows they’re making an effort to correct their mistakes, which is a very good thing. And some DLC is free, which is great. They’re adding new content to the game at no charge to you, which is never a bad thing. Yakuza 3 gets free DLC updates every week. So if the Yakuza developers can give out DLC for free, why can’t other developers?

Company currency
Microsoft Points. Wii Points. You know the drill. By selling you these points, they’re hoping you’ll spend them more freely than you would actual money. It’s the same thing, but there’s a psychological barrier there. Would you rather spend 1000 Wii Points or ten dollars? A dollar is tangible. You can hold ten dollars in your hand. Wii Points are abstract. They’re little pieces of data. They’re easier to part with. Expanding further, it’s a lot harder to spend just the amount you want. You can only buy MS Points or Wii Points in predetermined values, so you’re fucked if you want a 600 point game. You’ve got to buy 1000 points, and you’re stuck with 400 left over. Except you can’t buy anything with that; you need at least 500. But you can’t buy 100 points at a time, can you? So it’s another five dollars, just to get 900 points. Which still doesn’t divide evenly. You can only buy points in increments of five dollars, but most games aren’t priced in said increments. So you’re going to end up paying more than they’re charging, or buying games you didn’t really want to get rid of all your points. If you’re going to buy something on Marketplace or Wii Shop Channel, make sure you’re going to spend all of your points. I’m not saying to avoid these things altogether; just be aware of what’s going on.

Digital distribution
This is related to the two above points, and both will only become more of an issue as digital distribution becomes the mainstream. When you pay to download a game, you don’t own that game. You can only do with it what the license allows you to do. Want to take it to your friend’s house? Too damned bad. Want to use it as a frisbee? Eat shit. You can’t sell your games. This circumvents the used game markets, so be prepared to pay full price for three year old games. That’s totally ridiculous. You bought the game, and you have the right to do what you want with it. And you also have the right to buy the game from someone else, if they feel like selling it for less than the store does. Should you avoid all downloadable games? No, because some are only available via digital distribution. And in some cases, digital distribution is the only way a developer can afford to put their games on the market. But there will soon come a time when games are available in both download form and physical form (read: Warhawk). In such cases, ALWAYS buy the physical copy. When this happens, it’ll be because developers are testing us. They’re trying to see whether or not they can get away with releasing games ONLY over the Internet to cut down on manufacturing costs. So, stop and think. What are the disadvantages of download-only, aside from not being able to take the games with you, not being able to sell your games, and not being able to buy used games? What if the company you bought it from goes out of business, and your console breaks down? How do you get your game back? If you own a game via Steam and they go bankrupt, where are your games? If you buy a shitty game, you’re stuck with it. No seven day Gamestop refunds if you don’t like it. No pawning it off on your little brother as a gift. It just sits on your hard drive, taking up space. Which is another problem. The size of your library is limited by the size of your hard drive, so you can only have X amount of games. Sure, you could buy another hard drive. Or you could have your downloads tied to your account, ala Wii Shop Channel. But do you really want to have to re-download a game because you feel like playing it again, or switching between hard drives wondering which game file is on which drive? I sure don’t.

Special editions and games with peripherals
Don’t buy into this bullshit. Do you really think those pieces of plastic they give you with Rock Band jacks up their production costs threefold? Spare me. They sell you a game along with five dollars worth of plastic, and the game is now worth how much? 70, 90, 150 dollars? I’m not saying you shouldn’t buy games like Guitar Hero or Wii Fit. I’m saying you should buy the games and peripherals separately, and used if possible. The same thing goes for special editions. Special editions are market research. They’re seeing how much they can get away with charging for games. Do you think PS3 and Xbox 360 games would be sixty dollars this generation if nobody had bought Guitar Hero, Halo 2 Special Edition, Madden Special Edition, and Donkey Konga last time around? Hell no. If you dropped 90 dollars on Halo 3 Legendary, don’t be shocked at all if games are ten dollars more expensive next time around. It’s your fault.

Paying for online play
Let’s get this straight: PC online gaming is far superior to Xbox Live. So if (most) PC developers don’t charge for it, why does Microsoft get away with it? Sure, Xbox Live is superior to PSN and Nintendo WFC. But at what cost? Paying for online lets people know that it’s okay to charge for online. I can play Call of Duty World at War online for free on Wii, PC, and PS3. Why can’t it be free on Xbox 360? The answer is that people are willing to pay for it. So when Nintendo and Sony charge for their service next time around, don’t come crying to me. I fucking told you what would happen. There are alternatives to Xbox Live. Look into Xlink Kai. If your game is LAN compatible, you can play it online for free with people in your area over Xkink Kai.

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The video game industry is getting worse and worse, and it’s happening because of ignorant consumers. Video game companies are businesses, and they’re going to make good business decisions. Don’t hold it against them; just educate yourself and let them know that you won’t stand for it. Buy games with peripherals used. Don’t pay for DLC. Be weary of digital distribution, and NEVER pay for Xbox Live.

Comrade Obama, his staff, and his supporters always seem to cry out when you refer to his health care plan as “centralized health care” or “universal health care”. Well, technically, they’re right. It’s just government insurance. But it amounts to the same thing, and I’m going to explain both why it is the same and why it will not work.

The most obvious thing to note is that this is funded by we, the taxpayers. I’m paying for someone else’s health care whether I like it or not, even though I already pay for my own insurance from a private company. It’s a form of welfare, which is immoral.

Now, let’s get into the basic laws of economics and politics. When the government starts a new program like this, it’s going to cost money. So they’re going to raise taxes. And in an effort to make sure these new tax dollars are spent wisely, regulations are going to accompany these tax hikes. The effects of these regulations and tax hikes are many. First, the average consumer has less money in his pocket because he is paying more taxes. Second, private hospitals and private insurance companies are going to have to raise their prices and lay off employees to keep their profit margins the same. Some will even go out of business. So because the consumer has less money and insurance costs more, Joe Sixpack won’t be able to afford private insurance. So he either has to settle for the government insurance, or he has to go without. And with more people going to government insurance, supply of private insurance goes down because companies are going out of business. As supply does down, it creates a shortage. The laws of economics state that as supply decreases, demand increases. With low supply and high demand, prices increase further. Eventually, no one at all will be able to afford private insurance. Everyone will have to use “free” government insurance, and in order to keep up the government will again have to raise taxes or simply let people die. Probably a little of both. Higher taxes begin to affect other industries, and the cycle repeats itself. Higher taxes create unemployment, which encourages reliance on the government, which results in even higher taxes. The end result is the average working man having less money and less purchasing power.

And since the government will have no competition in the health care market, there is no one to keep them in check. Quality will deteriorate, costs will skyrocket, taxes will skyrocket, doctor shortages will come about, and waiting times will shoot through the roof. Stop and think about your local, government hospital. It’s usually _____ General (Denver General, here in Denver). I don’t know how it is where you live, but in Denver the General hospital is where you go when you have no other options. It is the worst hospital in the state. But under Obama’s plan, all hospitals will suck that bad.

The only way we’re going to dodge this bullet is if Obama fails to raise taxes enough to pay for it, which may happen. But don’t be fooled; the government has no business in our health care.

As we all know, inflation is the devaluation of the current medium of exchange. This means the loss of purchasing power of all current income and income saved from the past, such as savings, bonds, etc….

So when higher inflation begins, what would compel a person to continue holding this degrading wealth? I mean, once people realize that inflation will not stop anytime soon, they will see the value of their wealth degrading rapidly.

So what will people do?

The answer of course is spend. They will do anything in their power to get rid of their fiat money which is losing its value, and use it to buy things or invest in things which cannot be inflated at the whim of the government.

So what result will this have?

There are two problems I will mention. The first is something I will mention briefly because it is not the purpose of this article. It is the building of bubbles and false employment.

As people rush to ditch their degrading wealth, they will spend it on everything. They will invest it in areas which they normally would not invest in. They will buy things they don’t need. They will buy commodities.They will invest in unprofitable sectors, etc… Pretty much anything with real value and real practical uses. It is basically the same idea as the FED artificially lowering the interest rates. So this of course breeds false employment, malinvestments, etc…

So this leads me to my second point, the increased demand. As I mentioned before, people will consume much more when they expect continuous inflation. So the demand for goods and services will rapidly increase, but the potential output of the economy will not change (The only factors which can change the potential GDP or natural output are an increase in the labor force and/or technological advances).

Since the demand is increasing at such a high rate, the price level will also increase. More people will be borrowing from banks to consume, the marginal propensity to consume will increase, but the potential output will not increase.

And as I mentioned, people will be borrowing more from banks. Since banks loan out 90% of their reserves, this expands the money supply even farther. The exact formula is (1/.1)*deposits. This further expansion of the money supply results in more inflation. The excess inflation results in more consumption. Yet through all of this, productive capabilities will not increase, which also contributes to higher prices.

So the result is the inflationary spiral, which will continue until the whole system collapses or the government props up the prices and convinces consumers there will be no further inflation (which is impossible because inflation never stops in a fractional reserve system).

While people say the free market system is unrealistic, I would refute that by saying it is much more realistic than our current system which will inevitably bring economic collapse.

Even with total financial collapse being possible, our government is looking to a failed economic theory for help. It’s called Keynesian economics. This theory has been shown by both logic and history that it is not a successful economic system. Keynesian economics is the theory that the government can stimulate economic growth by intervening in the private sector.

Many times, a theory will look good on paper, but ultimately fail in the real world. Keynesian economics is not one of those theories. It fails both in theory and in the real world, and I will show a couple of reasons why.

Keynes says GDP=C+I+G+NX So he assumes that if you increase increase any variable in the equation, the GDP will increase accordingly. This is what his entire theory is based on. However, he consistently forgets that simply moving the wealth around is not creating wealth, but rather just allocating it differently. I’ll show some examples of this fallacy.

Before I address these issue, I would like to point out each variable I will use and give it’s definition:

GDP- Gross Domestic Product

C- Consumption

I- Investment

G- Government Spending

NX- Net Exports (Exports-Imports)

T- Taxes

MPC- Marginal Propensity to Consume (How much is spent out of every dollar)

First, consider this: C= c+{MPC*(Y-T)}. So in order to increase G, you have to increase taxes. Increasing taxes adds value to the variable T. Increasing T means that C will decrease. That is unavoidable.

So the increase in G is offset by the decrease in C due to higher taxes.The GDP doesn’t expand, it is just proportioned differently. A decrease in T (Taxes) has more of an effect on the economy than increasing G (Government spending) Why? Because consumers will only consume what they demand. We decide what has value. If we decide that iPods are more important to us than a parking ramp, iPods have more value. That’s because only the consumers can choose what has value by demanding it.

So when G is increased, production may increase, but not necessarily production of something we demand. For example, if government spending is increased to pay for a parking ramp in the middle of a cornfield, is that good? No, because something was produced which has no value because it’s not in demand. So government spending takes from consumers (the only people that can give value to something), and spends it on things which may not have value.

Consider this: According to this logic, shouldn’t the government hire people to run around and destroy things? If that was done, the government could spend the money to repair these things. It’s an increase in G and also gives jobs to people. So shouldn’t Keynes want that?

Of course, the problem is that nothing was created with value. So it did not expand our wealth.

All kinds of porblems arise when employment becomes an objective rather than a result. Keynesian economics is in large part a theory dedicated to fight unemployment. Since this is the case, all Kenesians are opposed to all technological advancements that make us more productive and successful, right? Of course, not, that was be ridiculous. But it would be entirely consistent for Keynesians to hold that position.

Another thing to understand, is that an increase in C (Consumption) is not intrinsically good. This is especially true when NX (Net Exports) decreases when C is increased.

For example, if our nation imports 90% of its goods and services, our NX will be negative, subtracting from our GDP. So what happens if our C increases by 50%? The -NX will increase enormously. So when we have a deficit in NX, when our C increases, the increase in C is offset by the decrease in NX.

Keynes even came up with a concept knows as the “Multiplier”. The concept states that government spending is a more powerful tool of economic growth than letting the market consume. The equation for the multiplier is: 1/(1-MPC). Say that every consumer spends $0.75 out of every $1.00 they make. That makes the MPC=.75. So now apply it to the equation: 1/(1-.75)=4. This is called the “Multiplier effect”. Keynes says that if the government spends $1,000,000 to “stimulate” the economy, you multiply it by this multiplier. So in this case, as I showed above, the multiplier is 4. So you multiply the government spending by whatever your multipler is. So in this case, it would be 4 x $1,000,000=$4,000,000. And POOF! That money taken from taxpayers just quadrupled.

Of course, if you actually think this through, it’s a ridiculous concept. As I mentioned before, the only way value can be added to a product, is through consumer demand, which only the consumers can decide. So when the government consumes, it is taking our money, and spending it on things not in demand. Since worthless things are produced, there is no growth. The only change, is that the consumer who add value to products, have less spending power because the government has taken it and spent it elsewhere.

The entire concept of a multiplier is a joke, yet it is still the most widely accepted economic theory today.

So that’s my shallow critique of the problems associated with Keynesian economics and basically any type of government intervention in the economy. Our economic problems will continue of we don’t break away from this mindset that the government can fix the economy by interfering and printing money.