Random Jottings

14 Mar, 2003 by John Hawkins

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Random Jottings:

— The latest thing that French apologists have come up with is, “You people are bashing the French, but they helped us in the American Revolution! Oh and do you want to give the Statue of Liberty back?” Let’s see, roughly 220 years ago the French helped us revolt against the Brits and about 105 years after that they gave us the Statue of Liberty. That being the case, isn’t it time that the French took a break from their customary treacherous weaselry and gave us a hand? I guess they’ve decided to take a hundred years off this time around, but maybe they’ll make it up to us in the 22nd century.

— I’ve seen some Brits out there who seem to be wondering if America appreciates their contribution in the upcoming war. Let me be the first to tell you that we do. The Bush administration has tried to send that signal as well by going through all this fan dancing to support Tony Blair at the UN and more notably by putting 2000 US troops under British command in the war. I can also tell you that the American people genuinely like and more importantly, RESPECT Britain more than any other country in the world. A lot of nations talk the talk, but when it’s time to walk the walk there’s no nation I’d rather have with us more than the Brits.

— Before the rest of the world gets jealous, we appreciate the rest of our allies too — especially Australia, Israel, & Spain, as well as the Poles, Czechs, Latvians & the rest of the “New Europeans.”

— This part of a William Hague editorial was so exceptional that I thought it deserved more attention…

“But now Americans are roused once again. They suffered on 11 September an attack on their own soil more devastating to human life than Pearl Harbor itself. Europeans sympathized, but they did so in the manner of sympathizing with a friend who has suffered a bereavement. Americans actually experienced the bereavement. Pre-emptive warfare is their response, and if it had been Canary Wharf or the Eiffel Tower that had been reduced to dust, such a policy would be cheered to the echo.”

— A lot of people have asked me, “Hey, how do you get all of those interviews with well known authors & columnists?” Well, I have this amazing technique that I use — are you ready for this — I write them an email and ask them to do an interview =). I know it’s earth shaking — but what people don’t see is all the people who turn me down or ignore my emails. That list includes Andrew Sullivan, Jesse Lee Peterson, David Horowitz, Christopher Ruddy, John Douglas, Joseph Farah, Jonah Goldberg, Neal Boortz, Matt Drudge, & Ann Coulter among others. You win some & you lose some — but the important thing is to keep going forward anyway.

— You may not know this, but Orianna Fallaci “captured” four Iraqi soldiers in the Gulf War. She tells the story in her latest column…

“(I)n 1991 the Iraqi army deflated like a pricked balloon. It disintegrated so quickly, so easily, that even I captured four of its soldiers. I was behind a dune in the Saudi desert, all alone. Four skeletal creatures in ragged uniforms came toward me with arms raised, and whispered: “Bush, Bush.” Meaning: “Please take me prisoner. I am so thirsty, so hungry.” So I took them prisoner. I delivered them to the Marine in charge, and instead of congratulating me he grumbled: “Dammit! Some more?!?”

— If you want to know why we did so poorly in Vietnam despite having outrageously high kill ratios and never losing a major battle, you have only to read the following clip from an article about Air Force pilot Ed Rasimus’ experiences in Vietnam…

“Mr. Rasimus is a patriot in his quiet way, but he’s not sentimental about the work his country sent him to do or about the manner in which he was supposed to accomplish it. Over North Vietnam, it was OK to attack a missile site if it fired at him but not if it was still under construction. He wasn’t allowed within 20 miles of the China-Vietnam border, nor could he attack the North Vietnam seacoast, which was reserved for U.S. Navy fighter-bombers.

On one mission, he and his $15 million aircraft were risked in an attempt to destroy 50 barrels of petroleum–about as much fuel as his F-105 burned in the attempt. Returning to Thailand with flak holes in the wing and hydraulic systems gone, he had to report his troubles as a “mishap” because officially there were no warplanes in Thailand, hence no battle damage was possible.”

— Let me give the Dems some credit for forcing James Moran out of his leadership position. They may not do the right thing all that often, but they did in this case. Plus, as an added bonus it’ll make all the anti-Semites go nuts. I may have to hit some of the Nazi/racist boards this week-end to see if I can find some nice paranoid ranting about how this proves the Jews really run America for a Monday edition of ACPOTI (anyone can post on the internet).

PS: If you run across a bunch of Nazis, Islamo-Fascists, lunatics, conspiracy theorists, or ultra-leftist kooks, feel free to email me about it. I’m always looking for new ACPOTI suggestions.

— From a Hans Blix interview with MTV…

“To me the question of the environment is more ominous than that of peace and war. We will have regional conflicts and use of force, but world conflicts I do not believe will happen any longer. But the environment, that is a creeping danger. I’m more worried about global warming than I am of any major military conflict.”

Here we are, quite possibly days away from war and the UN’s Head Weapons Inspector seems to be primarily concerned about whether it’s going to be warmer or not 50 years from now. It just boggles the mind…

— RWN reader Lee M. Weinberg pointed out an error in a Reuters piece that talks about Saddam’s gift of $245,000 to “(f)amilies of Palestinians killed by Israel .” The problem with that is that this money is going to families of suicide bombers who killed themselves and took innocent Israelis with them. Maybe that’s a small point, but it irritates me nonetheless to see Reuters talk about these people like they were victims instead of psychotic terrorists.

— An email from RWN reader Calodin. I loved the Tim Allen comparison…

I stumbled on your site, or rather the old one (Brass Knucles) when i started playing Utopia and wanted to know everything about Utopia. And i have now followed your website for a couple of years.

I have been following the US-Allies/UN/IRAQ thingy closely, and all i have to say is that the US and it’s allies are doing what everyone around the whole world is afraid of doing, which is DOING THE RIGHT THING. The EU and the whole lot of peaceniks that are opposing the war does not have the GUTS to do what is needed.

The Peaceniks are somewhat like the guy Tim Allem played in Home Improvement. He means well when he does all the repairing, painting and power tools stuff himself. But in the end, he only makes a mess of everything cos he’s dumb, near-sighted and generally an *ssclown who does not admit he is wrong. The US is the bearded guy who actually knows what he is doing, has the skill to do them and will do it to cover the back of Tim.

What the US (Mr. Bush) is trying to do is to cover our *sses for the future, not wait untill everything is a big mess and then do damage control.

Thank you, your country for what they are doing.”