[fporretto]

There is much to ponder here, and much diamond-hard truth, though I disagree with Joe Bob about Bush acting like an absolute monarch, and our foreign policy being run by a billionaire cabal.

I hope FReepers, and Americans generally, spare some thought for what kind of country, organized along what kind of principles, they want to have for the next century.

Freedom, Wealth, and Peace,
Francis W. Porretto
Visit the Palace Of Reason:
http://palaceofreason.com

[boris]

There is much to ponder here, mostly how Joe Bob went from a pretty decent writer and thinker to a drooling moron.

"Like Napoleon, he likes to strike first and negotiate later, figuring that we live in a state of perpetual warfare anyway and so we might as well have the advantage of the blitzkrieg."

Yeah. Strike first, like, you know, scuttling that North Korean freighter shipping missiles to the middle-east powder keg.

Strike first, like, you know, demolishing that expensive base we built to protect the Saudis and then being told we could not use it against Saddam.

Strike first, like, you know, making that North Korean nuclear site into a vague smear on the soil.

Strike first, like, you know, revoking the visas of every Saudi, Egyptian, Syrian, Irani, Iraqui, etc, still living on our soil and accepting our hospitality.

Strike first, like, you know, a blanket cessation of all new visas from those nations.

Strike first, like, you know, maybe a 1-megaton burst over Mecca, just to get their attention.

Strike first, like, you know, wiping the Dome of the Rock clean of islamic obscenities and presenting the scrubbed surface to Israel.

Stuff like that--you know--stuff a nation at war commonly does.

--Boris

[discostu]

I got through the third paragraph and the only response I can think of is a quote from Tweak of South Park:
Dad! Metaphors!

On topic I think he's crazy, omst of us pay little if any attention to the "threats", we've got lives to lead and anyway most of us don't live on the East Coast which is the target area the bad guys seem obsessed with. We don't "send messages", we just do our thing.

I'm reminded of what a friend of mine said, the topic of that discussion was the paranormal vs PsiCop (aka The Skeptical Enquirer), as we got back to work he rattled off this great line: but in the end it boils down to this, if a UFO landed on the White House lawn tonight I'd still have to go back to work in the morning. I think that's the real metaphore for life under a terrorist threat. Some people might be trying to "decypher messages" but the truth is, we're just going to work.

[Denver Ditdat]

We believe they should be pressed into military service as a matter of our right and their dues,

Psssstttt... Joe Bob... put down that water bong, take off the tie dye, switch off the lava lamp and black light, and take a look at your calendar. The 70s are long over, and no American has been "pressed into militaty service" since 1973.

[CougarGA7]

The way Joe Bob's article reads, it sounds like he is talking about Multiple Personality Disorder, not Schizophrenia. Not only is this article bland, but I'm given the impression that he didn't even do his research.

[aruanan]

The mood of the country entering the third year of this strange new century is that of a paranoid schizophrenic.

Another manifestation is the insistence, on the one hand, by liberals that the clear declarations by Al Qaeda and related terrorist groups of their intention to destroy us really don't mean what they say and, on the other hand, that innocuous comments, objectively non-offensive, by Trent Lott of a friend at a birthday party are manifestations of a secret, horrific racism whose home is the Republican party that threatens to destroy the very heart and soul of the nation.