Dogs made a funny statement yesterday that I can relate to: "I visited all 4,593,299 available weblogs this morning. I can't find anything to comment on that hasn't already been commented on in exactly the way I would have commented. What this means is that I must scratch around in the recesses of my mind for some other 'original content,' which I don't have right now." I read this morning thinking that I would come up with something new and interesting to say, but all I keep tossing around in my head are things that I've already shouted into a cave.
Yesterday I met a Reservist who was the most conflicted man I've talked to in a long while. He went off on a tirade against the USA and then switched gears mid-rant and slammed the Germans for a while. Then he talked about his recent tour in Iraq and what a good thing it was that the US had gone to help Iraqis, but then did a half-gainer and started saying that the US is the most dangerous country on the planet. He thinks the war in Iraq is just, but he wants Hillary to be President. He has some serious issues.
But one of the things he brought up was the WMD. Those jävla förbannad WMD. Sweet Jesus, I wish we could all look at the big picture here and forget about those stupid weapons for a minute. What did that Marine say the other day? "You can't even find an AK-47 in someone's home" so how can they expect us to find all weapons in Iraq right away?
Look, we should all agree on one of two things. Common ground, you know. Either Saddam had WMDs and has hidden them or gotten them out to Syria or somewhere else, or Saddam was so mean that no one told him the truth that they really weren't able to make any WMDs. So, if we must be forced to keep talking and thinking about those mfing WMDs, we have to assume that no one lied. President Bush honestly did think that Iraq had weapons or the potential to make weapons, just as both Clintons, Albright, Kennedy, and many others said back during the last presidency. And we have to assume that Saddam himself thought that he had WMDs, for what else would have made him feel so gutsy? Either he had them, or he was duped big time.
So when a Reservist says that we were right to go to war, but it was under false pretenses because we haven't found any WMDs yet, I want to rip his everlovin' head off. Especially when he's just finished telling me a story about how he stumbled upon dozens of dead bodies in a Ba'ath Party meeting house in Iraq that had been rotting for months. Months. Why hadn't anyone found those bodies before? I mean, they had months to find them, right? Well how come they weren't found earlier?
He also said that since the US has WMDs, we shouldn't be allowed to tell others who can and can't have them. Hmm. So since my husband carries a weapon in his job, he shouldn't be able to say that others can't do the same? If Iraqi shopkeepers, farmers, and reporters think it's OK to carry and use weapons as often as a soldier does, then that should be OK, right Reservist man? Who are we to say they can't, after all. Why don't you go back to Iraq and do your job again under these new "we're all equal" conditions?
And to say that the US is the most dangerous country in the world is just plain stupid. I asked this man straight out if he thought that head-to-head the first country to use a nuclear bomb would be the USA or Saddam's Iraq, and he said us. He is a damn fool. I know plenty of wives here who would love to see him proven right. I've heard many of them say we should've just nuked Iraq into a parking lot and not wasted our time and money on this stupid war. I know wives who don't give a flying leap about Iraqis and would push the button themselves if it meant their husbands didn't have to go spend a year on the other side of the earth. If this Reservist actually believes that our government is more ruthless than Saddam's, then he needs a big reality check. And I'm tired of hearing this nonsense.
I'm just sick of it. Of Michael Moore and John Kerry and Sean Penn and Jacques Chirac and everyone else whose image of the United States is that we're just itchin' to start somethin'. I'm tired of people saying we're a bully, as if we enjoy sending our troops to all these jacked up countries all over the globe to try to straighten out some centuries-old mess. I'm tired of people glorifying the UN, which couldn't even buy peace without a hefty contribution from the US. And I'm so tired of trying to explain world events and foreign policy to people in the military, people whose job it is to enforce it.
And I'm tired of hearing about those f-ing WMDs.
Posted by Sarah at March 13, 2004 09:53 AMConflicted Man comes across as mere garden-variety "Confused" until he gets to the part about wanting Hillary to be President. "Serious issues"? Understatement of the year. Sounds like he's been watching too much CNN and reading too much NYT.
Although it's not the most accurate analogy, perhaps our insistence that finding WMDs is not critically important is as irritating and frustratingly 'off-point' to the Left as their insistence that it was "just about sex" was to us.
Thanks much for the link! I definitely know what you mean about shouting intoo a cave, too.
Posted by: topdawg at March 13, 2004 11:59 AMIt gives me the shivers to hear that type stuff, and I do hear plenty of it here in Bush Country, Texas.
I just look at the people who say it in disbelief, how can they feel that way. Some people are still mad at him for his looks, he smirks, they say. Oh yes, big political fault, look and smile like your mother, for heaven's sake! And why would that make him dishonest? Give me a break.
The liberal establishment may yet get there wishes and we become a cowering, frightened, socialist country. It is disturbing and I don't have a husband in Iraq to worry about . But I have grandchildren I want to live in a free, democratic country. And I want that for you and all the rest of us, too.
Buurruuppppp - the mere thought of Hillary as a prez (shudders).
I'm also in that "who cares about the m.f.'n WMD's" club as well as the "no it's not either about oil" society.
Posted by: OkieMinnie at March 13, 2004 07:39 PMI think this guy is stuck in the third level of Maslow's Hierarchy.
Bogey asked why military people liked Bush better than Kerry since Kerry served in Vietnam. Many folks don't grasp that military service doesn't mean as much to military folks as being black seems to mean to blacks or being union means to union members. What we are interested in is getting a job done. Period.
Posted by: Mike at March 13, 2004 09:49 PMA big 'yeah' to all of the above. I read recently (um in the last 6mos) that Japan just found a huge stash of artillery/wmd-like stuff under an airport runway from WWII!! Then there's the German stash found in about the same way, same goes for something found in VA from the US Military from 50 yrs ago. These people who keep saying this drivel are being disengenuous and are just looking for something to pin on BUSH so they can further their mantra of 'Bush Lied'. Remember a few weeks ago Sarah when Tim wrote something of a similar nature. I think we all go thru a 'fed up to here' phase with the mumbo jumbo speak of the 'truth challenged' pukes from the left or maybe from the uniformed. I can't wait or is it I'm afraid to listen or watch the Sunday news talk shows tomorrow. I'm continually amazed at the complicit nature of the media.
Anyway - it will pass for you as it did for me. At least I sure do hope it does.
As usual, Sarah, you hit the bullseye. I hope that the guy who wants Hillary to be president shows up for sick call. The man's in a bad way.
Posted by: Parkway Rest Stop at March 14, 2004 04:48 AMI just found your blog--great reading. Thanks. :o)
The guy who thinks the U.S. is a threat is just an idiot.
I'm ex-army (22SAS) and every time see an American battle group in our waters here (Australia) it makes me grin.."there stands freedom"...
Go well.
>>
It stands to reason that things we are not looking for are much less likely to be found.
While I agree with the lot of you, that this guy was full of hot air, I find it difficult to believe that in a country that's only a little bigger than texas, we couldn't turn up something in almost 2 years time. You can bet if we were looking for something this BIG, this important in Texas, we'd have found it. Discount of course the hazards, and what have you... You've got a lot of people, most of them capable, acting on "reliable" intelligence looking for these things and *poof*... nothing? Technology in espionage improves practically by the hour, the world isn't nearly as big as it used to be, it just doesn't add up. Am I saying Bush is a liar? No. But I do believe that there is more to this than meets the eye. Not necessarily oil, but there's something going on that nobody's talking about outside the oval office.
Secondly, why oust Hussein? The terrible ogre executed people for bad reasons? Of course he did. So then, why didn't we act pre-emptively toward Lenin? or Hitler? Hitler ordered the mass-murder of millions, for practically no reason at all. But even knowing that wasn't enough for us to go over and fight. No-- we had to be provoked... by this I'm referring to Pearl Harbor, another attack on the US that could have been at the very least defended against, if not for the nay-sayers and foibles of the military and intelligence committees.
I think the rest of the free-speaking world believes, given our current representation, we're not gutless... but incompetent and foolhardy...
And since we're bashing the left with awful words like 'truth challenged' (politically correct) and pukes (not politically correct) Let me ask you this -- What's so great about George Bush? Careful with your answer... I asked someone this once. Her answer? "I'm a republican".
"What???"
"I voted for a republican president once, and decided I was republican so now I always vote republican".
It suddenly occurs to me that a certain percentage of both sides sees it precisely this way... and I've officially lost all hope for a truly democratic country. Where leaders can be chosen based on the decision of a group of complete idiots to be one-sided, regardless of the issues at hand, We'd be better off flipping a damned coin!
Posted by: Mike at January 13, 2005 03:41 AM