OLD WEST VS. OLD EUROPE - You say we're cowboys like it's a bad thing

SF Chronicle ^ | 3-9-03 | Andrew Bernstein

[Oldeconomybuyer]

Those who oppose war with Iraq -- from foreign heads of state to homegrown anti-war protesters -- employ a common expression of contempt for the American war effort. America, they sneer, is acting like a "cowboy."

A mock interview with Saddam Hussein conducted by a European intellectual is written to show, in one news report's summary, "what out-of-control cowboys the Americans are."

[ppaul]

[homeagain balkansvet]

Texas Ranger captain Bill McDonald reputedly stated: "No man in the wrong can stand up against a fellow that is in the right and keep on a-comin'."

o Pelopponesian Wars, 433-403 BC. Athens v. Sparta. Sparta, the bad guys, win.

o Wars of empire, 233 BC - 9 AD. Rome v. Everybody. Rome, the bad guys, win, except at Teutobuerger Wald, where the Germans, the bad guys, win.

o Battle of Nis, Serbia, 387 AD. Rome v. the Goths. The Goths, the bad guys, win.

o Invasion of Anglo-Saxony, 1066. Normandy v. Saxon England. The Norman bastard, the bad guy, wins.

o Manzikert, Asia Minor, 1088. Byzantium v. the Turks. The Turks, the bad guys, win.

o Battle of Kosovo, 1389, Serbia v. the Turks. The Turks, the bad guys, win. (Whatever was made of this battle in later years, the Turks brought an era of terrible darkness to the Balkans when they took over Serbia.)

o Battle of Agincourt, 1415, English Empire v. the French. The English, the bad guys win (Shakespeare was a liar; Henry V was a thug and a war criminal).

o Fall of Constantinople, 1453, Byzantium v. the Turks. The Turks, the bad guys, win.

o Fall of Tenochtitlan, 1521. Spaniards v. the Aztecs. The Spaniards, the bad guys, win (although it's a REAL HARD CALL here, as the Aztecs were ALSO the bad guys).

o Fall of Incan Empire, 1532. Spaniards v. the Incans. The Spaniards, the bad guys, win again (but see above about the Aztecs; double ditto).

o Fall of Charles I; Cavaliers v. the Roundheads, 1649. The Roundheads, the bad guys, eventually win. (More specifically, The King, a bad guy, loses to Parliament, made up of slightly less bad guys, who then loses to the Roundheads, REAL bad guys, that is, religious bigots extraordinaire who execute the King and chase all the men of good sense out of government for eleven years as Cromwell rules by decree.)

I supposed I made my point. History is replete with bad guys who win. The Cowboy Code ain't entirely accurate.

[jammer]

Great post. I've wondered the same thing as the author. One attribute of cowboys that I find sadly missing in many Americans is their willingness and ability to, "stomp their own snakes and saddle their own broncs." Oh, if only we still possessed as a nation the cowboy's independence of action and thought . . .

[jammer]

Looks to me like your history is replete with bad guys fighting bad guys.

[alwaysconservative]

Thanks for posting this! I have often said that having an unpredictable, unfettered (free) cowboy in charge is a wonderful thing. It took President Bush less than 60 days after 9/11 to liberate Afghanistan and break up the Taliban, just fourteen months after that to get a unanimous UN resolution to disarm Iraq, and less than six months after that to actually get Iraq to start to come clean and start destroying weapons that they claimed not to have. Hooray for cowboys who get things done! And I must note that in the Iraq situation, all of this was accomplished without a shot being fired.

[Illbay]

How is this "Breaking News"?

[Oldeconomybuyer]

It's not breaking news. It's an editorial.

[homeagain balkansvet]

History largely IS bad guys fighting bad guys. All you can ask for most of the time is that the less bad guys win.

I exempt ourselves, unashamedly. We ARE the Good Guys. Except maybe in Mexico, 1845. That one is still a little hard to explain.

[jammer]

And maybe the Spanish American war. I see your point, and agree with much, but am not entirely persuaded that "cowboy" as we mean it describes either side in the wars you cited. In the spirit of friendship, let's agree to disagree about that "Norman bastard", from whom I'm descended. :)

[yoe]

The cowboy is a symbol of the crucial virtues of courage and independence.

The American “cowboy” is today, still a mannerly, almost courtly gentleman of strength, honor, and integrity. He is a man capable of accomplishing the most menial tasks to the most laborious and difficult tasks with patience, cleverness, and sometimes with stealth. He is a veterinarian, a lawyer, a doctor, a diplomat, a leader, a teacher, a poet and sometimes an artist. He loves the land and husbands it for the benefit of all flora and fauna on it. He knows and accepts responsibility and performs accordingly; He is an American and proud of it. In short his characteristics are enviable. They are labeling President Bush correctly

[homeagain balkansvet]

Call me a cowboy-pessimist, one who believes in standing up for the right, but one who has too much painfully acquired knowledge about the capacity for evil inherent in human nature, even one that thinks itself righteous. "The human heart is most untrustworthy," said one of the Medjugore visionaries. How right he is. Or as C.S. Lewis put it, in Screwtape: "My own heart--I need no other--teacheth me the wickedness of the ungodly."

Much as I despise the anti-war left, I also know that any act as consequential as the war we now begin MUST be carefully considered, and that all GOOD reasons for NOT acting must be reflected upon before one starts. Not all our opponents on this issue are our enemies. And not all who would join us on this Ninth Crusade are our friends.

[ROCKLOBSTER]

Fall of Charles I; Cavaliers v. the Roundheads, 1649 .......I supposed I made my point. History is replete with bad guys who win. The Cowboy Code ain't entirely accurate

Well......except in all of your examples, the US hadn't invented cowboys yet.

[Rocky]

It's High Noon. The train has arrived. The town's people have abandoned the sheriff. Even his new bride is ready to desert him. But he resolves to stand alone against the evil men who are coming to kill him.

If you picture G.W. Bush (or the U.S.) as Gary Cooper in High Noon, there are certainly appropriate analogies with the cowboy image. And there is nothing to be ashamed of in this. A principled stand against evil will always have detractors, and the only thing to do in the face of such opposition is to stick to your convictions. God bless George W. Bush, and grant him the wisdom and courage to bring this to a successful conclusion.

You can hear "Do Not Forsake Me, Oh My Darling" playing in the background as the hero rides off into the sunset after taking care of the bad guys.

[homeagain balkansvet]

Fair enough, except that the Cowboy is just a 19th century update of the Crusader knight, sans peur et sans reproche, fighting for the right while exercising the right to bear arms and the power to mete justice. The sherriff's badge is just a knightly Coat of Arms in miniature--indeed, the name 'sherriff' itself was derived from an Arabic word for lawman that entered the English language during the Crusades.

I'm not saying that the cowboy image is wrong. I'm just saying that the cowboy/lawman must himself examine his own heart before acting. To think one is above acting unrighteously leads to disaster: witness the greatest of the Knights, Lancelot the Strong, who could not stop himself from betraying his beloved King by making the Queen his bedmate.

[ALS]

The Men That Don't Fit In
By Robert W. Service

[LibKill]

Yep, Bush has a lot of 'cowboy' in his nature. And that's a good thing.

If Saddam had brain cell one in that misshapen head of his, he'd give up right now.

[jammer]

Can't disagree with one thing you said or the grand way you said it.

[Man of the Right]

More Euroignorance.

Cowboys are clear-thinking realists. They have to be living on the edge.

Selected questions and comments by supposedly brilliant highly educated European money managers to me:
1. What will America do to replace the population lost as a result of the AIDS epidemic?
2. I'm thinking of going sightseeing. Can I drive from New York City to the Grand Canyon and back over the weekend?
3. Yes, Idaho: That's next to Iowa.
4. I'm thinking of taking a driving trip. Will I need to show my passport at the New York-Connecticut border?
5. I would never visit the South. They still beat negroes there.
6. Is it safe to bring my wife to Chicago because of all the gangsters there?

[tillacum]

BUT they were Not Americans fighting evil. Americans fight to free civilians from their horror, not for the evil one's land, except here in our country, then we made reservations for the natives to eek out a living.