The Fool's Progress

There was no insurgency in occupied Germany or Japan following World War II. Why do you think that is? We had an occupying army of over a million troops in each defeated country. Post-war Japan and Germany were not lawless or dangerous places. We have never even had 200,000 troops in Iraq, allowing the insurgency to take root and thrive. To fix the problem we need to take our duty as occupier seriously; we broke Iraq and we need to fix it.

Next week we need to rotate every soldier and marine, reserve and National Guard, who has not been in Iraq the past six months there. That should get us to 300,000 troops or so. Once in place, we must quell the Sunnis. Place a gun emplacement and tank on every corner anywhere not secure throughout the country. Work with the Shia and Kurds to identify Baathist leftovers, and kill them. This will be messy and dangerous, but necessary to win. Seal the borders with Iran and Syria. Warn Syria one time about our seriousness, and then take action as so they quit being a problem, including further military attacks.

Back home, we need to reinstitute a draft. Three-year enlistments, 21 to 26 year olds or so, whatever it takes to raise a half-million troops. They begin to rotate into Iraq in nine to twelve months, with experienced regular army volunteer non-coms and volunteers sprinkled in. Once the new Army secures Iraq, we can begin rebuilding an infrastructure that Saddam decimated before we even arrived on the scene. The world, and Americans, will know we are serious about these threats.

These measures would require some pain for the American people. Based on our history I think we can take it. If we fail to take our obligations seriously, we will be staring at a fundamental Islamic state by 2010.

I realize my descriptions do not apply to every boomer, or maybe even to most of them. I am specifically addressing those that were tossing around Frisbees and roach clips during the summer of love, but are now security moms and dads. They made it under the stars on the beach then, but are now outraged that Janet Jackson bares a breast during the Super Bowl. We have Ms. Roe, of Roe vs. Wade, who is now anti-abortion. In addition, our commander-in-chief, who was born again at forty? I guess that means I have seven more years to be a hedonist and no one would mind.

Boomers have reinvented what it means to be an American, for the worse. Sacrifice has disappeared from our civic vocabulary. Boomers have reinvented what it means to be an individual, for the worse. Instant gratification, what I want, right now. Everything they have touched has degenerated: our culture and politics are now infantile.

The greatest threat to our way of life in this century is religious fundamentalism and the terror it fuels. Our President is not addressing this problem seriously, but as a Boomer, with no pain or duty involved for all, but only those who choose it by joining the military. This transcendental approach will not result in victory for our country. We need to grow up, and face our duty as a people. We need to pay for what the government spends, not run bigger and bigger deficits. The President talking tough while focusing on mid-term elections will not help us win our war.

This is the argument agains our Manichean President, coupled with Angelo Codevilla in No Victory No Peace. One can be with him and against him, for a sane if more costly approach to the war Bush is attempting to execute on the cheap with no sacrifice from ordinary Americans. World War II was hard. A future war with China would be hard. A real campaign against Islamic Fundamentalism would be hard, mainly due to our oil problem.

The article in the Weekly Standard points out that we are not taking suicide bombers seriously enough, and that they are the perfect smart weapons. They are motivated by the gaining of paradise in a way that Westerners cannot comprehend. Nor are we even attempting to.

The article even approaches a Dennettian point:

What if Darwin was right conceptually, but failed to grasp that homo sapiens' most powerful evolutionary strategy is faith?

I wonder if the author knows that fertile ground has been well trod by the 'evolutionists', and is the subject of Dennett's forthcoming book.

The missing point in the piece, however, is that the way to win the war on religious extremism is to continue our materialist expansion. Air-dropping Maxim Mags and Islam Barbie dolls across the Middle East would be a good place to start. A materialist approach to life offers no paradise for murder. There are no athiest suicide bombers. Religion, in any flavor, is the ultimate problem of the 21st Century. Enjoy the world, this is it.

Last night marked the first time this century that I didn’t listen to a President’s State of the Union Address. I was finishing a drink at Teller’s in downtown Lawrence, recovering from a difficult day being the dad, and an offer falling through on the house we have for sale. Anyway, I distinctly remember watching the Clintonian mea culpa address while in Hawaii, and a later Slick Willy edition from a bar in Kansas City while home on leave. Have I reached the age where I no longer care how they posture, or are the immediate world of diapers and being the dad more important? In any event, I really didn’t care what he said, but was intrigued to hear that he acknowledged our ‘addiction’ to oil without muttering ANWR in the same breath.

Anything that calls attention to my country’s ridiculous practice of paying massive amounts of our GDP to people who want to kill us so we can all drive Hummers to Wal-Mart is a good thing. Maybe that will be my Earth Day piece for the KC Star.

The littlest guy is sick, happiness is holding a puking toddler over the nearest sink. As a good old friend of mine recently told me, 'you procreated, that changes everything.' You can say that again Carl.