Dangers within and without.
It is hard to believe that the greatest social experiment in history has fallen on such hard times as these. Whatever our faults, whatever wrongs have been done, whatever mistakes have been made, America is clearly the greatest provider of personal opportunity, individual freedom and collective prosperity on Earth. It seems a large number of Americans do not appreciate this fact. Nor do they realize that the demise of The U.S. would cause the loss of the freedoms that we all hold dear.
Some of those who benefit most from living in the USA have taken dangerously self-defeating positions. Does Rosie O'Donnell not understand that while conservative Christians are merely opposed to gay marriage, the radical Islamists would have us torture and kill gays and lesbians on sight, as they do currently in their own countries. She benefits daily from the freedoms and the right to debate differences of opinion afforded by the American system, which is based very directly on Christian principles of justice and fairness. She may well disagree with Christians on what rights gays should have, but what manner of lunacy causes her to claim Christians are just as much a threat as radical Muslims. One also has to question the sanity of her audience who howl their approval of such nonsense.
In the past, Americans have been able to set aside political and social differences to fight together for the common good. When the fight was over, we'd then get back to debating among ourselves, trying to mould and shape an even better country and future for all. Sadly, in this current conflict there are a great many Americans who cannot see the current external threat for what it is and set aside their partisan interests. Therefore, they themselves present another kind of threat from within. If we can't at least present a unified opposition to the enemy then they are given greater hope that they can conquer us.
The radicalized Islamists have announced their intention to take over the world. They indiscriminately murder men, women and children daily all around the globe, they cut the heads off soldiers, reporters and social workers, and seek to force their specific vision of Islamic law on all people everywhere. What do we do in the face of this? At GitMo we have soldiers cutting the American flags off water bottle labels because the inmates might be offended by them, we play the National Anthem at a lower volume because they complained, we offer colonoscopies to inmates over 50 years of age because we are concerned about their health, we have Senators and members of Congress demanding these prisoners of war get full Habeas Corpus rights as though they were criminals in the American justice system. Those same fools are blocking the appointment of a capable, no nonsense guy like John Bolton to his post at the U.N. We have a hostile press who prints selected national security secrets leaked to them by their friends in government who support the opposition party. We have an opposition party who will not support the President on any effort, or give him credit for any good deed done.
Forget the low inflation, increased productivity, growing federal revenues, low unemployment and a robust economy. The left won't even talk about it, except to say they'll stop it all with increased taxes if they get into power. And the only war plans they have offered are for the war against Republicans and President Bush. If gas prices go up, it is Bush's fault. If gas prices go down it is not news, and if it is news it is only to report some stupid theory about his manipulating prices to get votes. If we are not attacked, they claim it is not due to any efforts by the President and his team. If we are attacked, they will claim he is fully responsible because it happened on his watch. We can already see that in those who are willing to white-wash eight years of attacks and lack of serious response during the 1990s, while claming Bush didn't do enough to get Bin Laden in the eight months before 9/11. The really far-out loony fringe even courts theories that our own government planned and executed the 9/11 attacks, despite those idiotic theories being disproven by a variety of investigators. An this theory offers no answer for the fact that Bin Laden and his friends claim credit for those attacks and have even provided video of the hijackers in his camp explaining why they are going to do it. This crack-pot thinking even extends to some elected officials! This is how waste our time and energy.
We are not so much in trouble because of the external threat. That we could handle if we could at least unite under the flag and confront them. It is the internal threat of petty differences that prevent us from working together to confront our sworn enemies. The President has taken the fight to the enemy directly. His ambitions to establish a free democratic country in the Islamist world may or may not succeed, but he has good intentions. I wish more of us could give the man credit for his good intentions and join in the fight with him.
-Alan
posted by A. Stewart @ 11:01 AM
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