Posted on 03/12/2003 11:02:03 PM PST by JohnHuang2
Is there a columnar equivalent of Viagra? I mean, I started writing about the impending war with Iraq in late September 2001 and after a year and a half I'm beginning to flag. I don't think I've had a new thought on Iraq in months. I agree with what I said about toppling Saddam on this page way back on September 27th 2001. Don't bother looking it up. I've said the same words in a slightly different order a gazillion times since and, even taking the President at his word that this is Saddam's last last chance, that still gives me a couple more weeks or so to say it another half-dozen times. I'm like Tony Orlando in Atlantic City, getting older and sadder singing the same song every night.
This is the Mesopotamian desert of punditry. I've been parched of fresh opinion for months, and the damn mirage of war shimmering on the horizon never gets any nearer.
The only consolation is that the anti-war crowd are having an even harder time keeping it up than I am. The "human shields" are leaving Iraq, having given up trying to shield anything but the remaining shreds of their dignity. "They have the courage of their convictions," said one of their defenders on the radio. Au contraire, that's the one thing they don't have. They got to Baghdad only to find their Iraqi "co-ordinators" wanted to deploy them not at "humanitarian" facilities but at military bases. One British teacher said he was used to working with young children and would have preferred to be deployed at an orphanage. Pity the poor Iraqi official who had to explain to the guy that the orphanage has already got all the human shields it needs: they're called "orphans."
The bewildered Brit seemed to find this hard to follow: Here's a man who's convinced that Bush and Rumsfeld are slavering to drop a bunch of daisycutters on Iraqi moppets, but thinks they'll cease and desist just because some droning Welsh leftist is sitting amongst all those inviting underage targets. It would be nice to think that these posturing ninnies will be slightly ashamed at the realization that they were no more than pathetic Saddamite stooges, but no doubt by the time they're back home their cheerleaders on the left will have restored their sense of their own heroism.
Even more telling than the human shields scramming out of town is the alarming failure of recent "naked protests" to get naked. Many of my fellow warmongers have mocked the nude protests mounted by the women of California's Marin County, cruelly pointing out that many of the bits on show are excessively flabby and saggy. But I'll take what's on offer. If we have to have an incoherent, self-loathing "peace" movement, then women showing off their hooters in support of a culture that would stone them to death for showing off their ankles is about as good as it's gonna get.
But, even by the impressive standards of risibility demonstrated by the "peace" movement, has there ever been a sadder "naked protest" than that staged this week by the students of Illinois Wesleyan University? The male "nudes for peace" stood around wearing their boxer shorts and, worse, little white ankle socks and sneakers. C'mon, guys, why so shy about letting us inspect your weapons of mass destruction? According to the Security Council resolution on nude protesting, it's a material breach to put material over your breech. If you don't want to take it off, maybe you should skip the naked thing entirely, stay inside and read up on what's the capital of Saudi Arabia.
Meanwhile, the celebrities keep yakking on, despite a poll indicating that celebrities pontificating on the war doesn't change the public's attitude to war, only to the celebrity. So the Screen Actors' Guild is now worrying about a new "blacklist" against anti-war celebrities. No such blacklist exists. And for Ed Asner and Mike Farrell to lose work over their opposition to the war would require first for them to be offered some. It seems a mite inconsistent to use your celebrity status to advance your politics and then complain that your politics is impacting your celebrity status. Here, for example, is elderly rocker Chrissie Hynde on stage the other day:
" 'Have we gone to war yet?' she asked sarcastically, early on. 'We f-----' deserve to get bombed. Bring it on.' Later she yelled, 'Let's get rid of all the economic s--- this country represents! Bring it on, I hope the Muslims win!' "
Fair enough. Each to their own. But, if this sort of thing makes some of us less enthusiastic about buying Miss Hynde's albums or watching Martin Sheen's TV show, it's hard to see why their corporate masters shouldn't take it into account. As Miss Hynde would say, that's the economic s--- this country's all about.
So the longer this non-war goes on the more exhausted the pitiful narcissism of the "peace" poseurs looks. Did you see those "Code Pink" protests Western feminists staged to mark "International Women's Day"? Nazif Mamik Tofik, an Iraqi Kurd, didn't. Last week, as she approached an Iraqi border post, the guards, without saying a word, doused her in gasoline and set her alight. It would seem it's too much to expect the West's pampered self-absorbed feminists to spare a thought for "international women" even one day a year.
But in this weird holding pattern even the non-trivial types are feeling the strain. Look at the poor old Arabs. "Your grave awaits you!" Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah tells Colonel Gaddafi. The Iraqi Vice-President calls the Kuwaiti Foreign Minister a "monkey" and sneers "Curse be upon your moustache." This is less offensive than "I fart on your beard" (a traditional Arabic expression of ill will), but only just. A couple more Arab League get-togethers and they'll be tearing each other's facial hair out.
And spare a thought for the poor Iraqi Army. As London's Sunday Mirror reported yesterday, "Terrified Iraqi soldiers have crossed the Kuwait border and tried to surrender to British forces -- because they thought the war had already started.
"The motley band of a dozen troops waved the white flag as British paratroopers tested their weapons during a routine exercise. The stunned Paras from 16 Air Assault Brigade were forced to tell the Iraqis they were not firing at them, and ordered them back to their home country telling them it was too early to surrender."
Awf'lly sorry, old bean. Try again in a fortnight, there's a good chap.
The Iraqi Army is begging to surrender en masse. Why torment them for month after month? This interminable non-rush to non-war is like a long, languorous, humid summer where everyone's sweaty and cranky and longing for the clouds to break and the cool, refreshing rain to fall. Bring it on. Please.
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