| GREG-STRANGE.COM |
"If you haven't found something strange during the
day, it hasn't been much of a day." -- John A. Wheeler
day, it hasn't been much of a day." -- John A. Wheeler
PROVIDING SUBSTANTIVE COMMENTARY ON THE
PEOPLE, POLITICS, EVENTS AND ABSURDITIES OF
OUR TIME. SERVED UP WITH ACERBIC WIT, YOU
SHOULD FIND IT QUITE SATISFYING.
PEOPLE, POLITICS, EVENTS AND ABSURDITIES OF
OUR TIME. SERVED UP WITH ACERBIC WIT, YOU
SHOULD FIND IT QUITE SATISFYING.
Throwing the Bums Out . . . and Replacing Them
With Worse Bums
So, you say you’re a Republican who was so ticked off at
Congressional Republicans for not being Republican enough,
that you went out and voted for some non-Republicans just to
teach the Republicans a lesson? At least that’s what I heard
many of you saying on radio talk shows during the days right
before and right after the recent midterm elections.
Well, congratulations! You did it. You taught them all a
lesson they’ll never forget. You voted in a bunch of people who
are even worse than the disappointing Republicans on all those
issues that you care about most. Brilliant! Now you can sit
back and watch as your new representatives surrender to the
insurgents in Iraq, the terrorists and, domestically, the illegal
aliens. Your fellow conservatives who didn’t pitch the
equivalent of a senseless electoral tantrum send you their
heartfelt thanks -- for nothing.
I’ve heard of people cutting off their nose to spite their face,
but this is ridiculous. If it was any other time it might not be so
potentially devastating, but this is post-9/11 and it’s no time to
be fooling around with our national security. Just exactly what
do I mean by that? Well, let’s put it this way . . .
Remember before the elections when some Republicans were
suggesting that al-Qaida would prefer to see Democrats get
elected? The Dems reacted with outrage and threw around
their standard lines about the despicableness of having their
patriotism questioned, etc., etc.
Well, lo and behold if Abu Ayyub al-Masri, terrorist-in-chief
of al-Qaida in Iraq, didn’t issue his very own post-election
statement issuing congrats all around to the American people,
who, in his words “voted for something reasonable in the last
elections.” What he meant by that was that the American
people, in their frustration over the war in Iraq, had voted for
enough Democrats to take the majority in Congress.
Of course, his praise for Americans was tempered by his
threats to kill more American soldiers and to blow up the
White House the first chance he gets, but the fundamental
point that al-Qaida prefers Democrats in power came through
loud and clear. Which goes back to my point about this being
no time to fool around with national security. Why would al-
Qaida prefer Democrats in power? Because most Democrats
show no interest in winning in Iraq and desperately want out as
soon as possible.
In other words, al-Qaida’s and the Democrats’ desires about
Iraq coincide -- they both want America out -- albeit for
different reasons. Al-Qaida wants America out of Iraq because
it doesn’t want freedom gaining a foothold in the region and so
it can turn the country into its own unmolested terror base
from which it can launch attacks on the West. The Democrats
want America out of Iraq because ever since Vietnam they don’t
think there’s much of anything in this world --short of a D-Day
type invasion of American shores by an enemy armada of
uniformed soldiers -- that’s worth fighting for.
Radical Islam? Please, say the Dems, it’s a law enforcement
issue, not some kind of serious threat to Western civilization.
Acts of Islamic terrorism are simply crimes which, like any
other crimes -- prostitution or illegal gambling, for instance, as
pointed out by John Kerry -- can be contained by law
enforcement to some acceptable “nuisance” level.
One is tempted to ask how many destroyed skyscrapers,
thousands of corpses and trillions of dollars damage to the
economy per five-year period, say, constitute an acceptable
level of nuisance, but such things are just so darned hard to
quantify. Suffice it to say that the simplistic idea of waging war
against the evil-doers will only provide further motivation for
them to commit more of their nuisancey acts.
Anyway, our new Congressional leadership would have us
believe, radical Islam is just the fringe element of an otherwise
perfectly acceptable religion and culture which is neither any
better nor any worse than any other, and to look at it any other
way would be racist, biased, bigoted, unsophisticated and
unenlightened.
Hmm, that’s funny, some might be thinking right now. Every
time someone like Pat Robertson or Jerry Falwell makes some
silly controversial statement, those same Democrats are sent
into unalloyed paroxysms of panic over the possibility of an
evangelical, right-wing Christian take-over of the country. But
Islamo-loonies take down skyscrapers filled with thousands of
people in Manhattan and it’s all about trying to understand
why they hate us and then adjusting our own misguided
behavior accordingly. These are the kinds of thought patterns
that inhabit the minds of many of the people who have just
been handed a lot of power.
Look, if you want a bottom line to chew over, here it is: If we
lose in Iraq, America’s credibility in the world is shot and that
ain’t good, given that America is the only country on earth that
is willing in any serious way to fight radical, apocalyptic
Islamic terrorism. Are you starting to wish you hadn’t so
cavalierly voted the bums out and put new worse bums in? You
should be because true to form, some Dems are already
throwing around talk about phased withdrawals and
timetables, all music to the enemy’s ears.
Here is perhaps the most important question of our time:
Will the most militarily powerful nation on earth -- and,
concomitantly, the rest of the world along with it -- be defeated
by a bunch of rag-tag primitives who honestly believe that the
creator of the infinite universe enthusiastically provides
virgins as heavenly rewards to Muslims who commit barbaric
mass murders on this singular dust-speck of a planet?
If the recent midterm elections weren’t just an aberration
and the peace-at-any-cost-ocrats continue as the dominant
power in this country, it is not only possible, but likely.
With Worse Bums
So, you say you’re a Republican who was so ticked off at
Congressional Republicans for not being Republican enough,
that you went out and voted for some non-Republicans just to
teach the Republicans a lesson? At least that’s what I heard
many of you saying on radio talk shows during the days right
before and right after the recent midterm elections.
Well, congratulations! You did it. You taught them all a
lesson they’ll never forget. You voted in a bunch of people who
are even worse than the disappointing Republicans on all those
issues that you care about most. Brilliant! Now you can sit
back and watch as your new representatives surrender to the
insurgents in Iraq, the terrorists and, domestically, the illegal
aliens. Your fellow conservatives who didn’t pitch the
equivalent of a senseless electoral tantrum send you their
heartfelt thanks -- for nothing.
I’ve heard of people cutting off their nose to spite their face,
but this is ridiculous. If it was any other time it might not be so
potentially devastating, but this is post-9/11 and it’s no time to
be fooling around with our national security. Just exactly what
do I mean by that? Well, let’s put it this way . . .
Remember before the elections when some Republicans were
suggesting that al-Qaida would prefer to see Democrats get
elected? The Dems reacted with outrage and threw around
their standard lines about the despicableness of having their
patriotism questioned, etc., etc.
Well, lo and behold if Abu Ayyub al-Masri, terrorist-in-chief
of al-Qaida in Iraq, didn’t issue his very own post-election
statement issuing congrats all around to the American people,
who, in his words “voted for something reasonable in the last
elections.” What he meant by that was that the American
people, in their frustration over the war in Iraq, had voted for
enough Democrats to take the majority in Congress.
Of course, his praise for Americans was tempered by his
threats to kill more American soldiers and to blow up the
White House the first chance he gets, but the fundamental
point that al-Qaida prefers Democrats in power came through
loud and clear. Which goes back to my point about this being
no time to fool around with national security. Why would al-
Qaida prefer Democrats in power? Because most Democrats
show no interest in winning in Iraq and desperately want out as
soon as possible.
In other words, al-Qaida’s and the Democrats’ desires about
Iraq coincide -- they both want America out -- albeit for
different reasons. Al-Qaida wants America out of Iraq because
it doesn’t want freedom gaining a foothold in the region and so
it can turn the country into its own unmolested terror base
from which it can launch attacks on the West. The Democrats
want America out of Iraq because ever since Vietnam they don’t
think there’s much of anything in this world --short of a D-Day
type invasion of American shores by an enemy armada of
uniformed soldiers -- that’s worth fighting for.
Radical Islam? Please, say the Dems, it’s a law enforcement
issue, not some kind of serious threat to Western civilization.
Acts of Islamic terrorism are simply crimes which, like any
other crimes -- prostitution or illegal gambling, for instance, as
pointed out by John Kerry -- can be contained by law
enforcement to some acceptable “nuisance” level.
One is tempted to ask how many destroyed skyscrapers,
thousands of corpses and trillions of dollars damage to the
economy per five-year period, say, constitute an acceptable
level of nuisance, but such things are just so darned hard to
quantify. Suffice it to say that the simplistic idea of waging war
against the evil-doers will only provide further motivation for
them to commit more of their nuisancey acts.
Anyway, our new Congressional leadership would have us
believe, radical Islam is just the fringe element of an otherwise
perfectly acceptable religion and culture which is neither any
better nor any worse than any other, and to look at it any other
way would be racist, biased, bigoted, unsophisticated and
unenlightened.
Hmm, that’s funny, some might be thinking right now. Every
time someone like Pat Robertson or Jerry Falwell makes some
silly controversial statement, those same Democrats are sent
into unalloyed paroxysms of panic over the possibility of an
evangelical, right-wing Christian take-over of the country. But
Islamo-loonies take down skyscrapers filled with thousands of
people in Manhattan and it’s all about trying to understand
why they hate us and then adjusting our own misguided
behavior accordingly. These are the kinds of thought patterns
that inhabit the minds of many of the people who have just
been handed a lot of power.
Look, if you want a bottom line to chew over, here it is: If we
lose in Iraq, America’s credibility in the world is shot and that
ain’t good, given that America is the only country on earth that
is willing in any serious way to fight radical, apocalyptic
Islamic terrorism. Are you starting to wish you hadn’t so
cavalierly voted the bums out and put new worse bums in? You
should be because true to form, some Dems are already
throwing around talk about phased withdrawals and
timetables, all music to the enemy’s ears.
Here is perhaps the most important question of our time:
Will the most militarily powerful nation on earth -- and,
concomitantly, the rest of the world along with it -- be defeated
by a bunch of rag-tag primitives who honestly believe that the
creator of the infinite universe enthusiastically provides
virgins as heavenly rewards to Muslims who commit barbaric
mass murders on this singular dust-speck of a planet?
If the recent midterm elections weren’t just an aberration
and the peace-at-any-cost-ocrats continue as the dominant
power in this country, it is not only possible, but likely.