Congressional Republicans and Democrats were tossing non-binding resolutions at one another this week, with members from both sides of the aisle babbling about some conflict that just barely resembles the one grinding on in Iraq. Not a very heartening spectacle to see the legislative branch being just as delusional as the executive. There were, of course, exceptions whose reasonableness cast the lunatic position of the majority in stark relief — Murtha, Feingold, a few others (Kucinich, of course, and McKinney, still swinging away). It does make one wonder how many times the war party can hash out the same lame points. We’re fighting 
them there so we don’t have to fight them here. It’s America or Al Qaida. When the Iraqis stand up, we’ll stand down. The ludicrous John McCain was on a morning show, using words like “frustratingly slow” and “painful”, and claiming “No one said this was going to be easy.” (Uh… yeah, they did. And you agreed.
For chissake, gentlemen, even Jalal Talabani — a Kurdish leader and president of Iraq — is calling for a timetable for U.S. withdrawal! Did any of these imbeciles check with the Iraqis to see what they want? Instead, we get sanctimonious speeches from the majority about how, if Murtha’s plan had been applied to WWII (an identical circumstance to the current war, apparently), we’d all “be speaking Japanese now”. (That’s adapted from the old classic that used to end with: “…we’d all have slanted eyes, now.”)
Of course, the week didn’t begin and end with Iraq alone. There was also a great deal heard about the other “axis of evil” members. As always, Iran was all over the news, with fresh accusations that Tehran is behind some elements of the insurgency in Iraq. Now that’s a particularly ironic piece of hysteria. (Imagine the gall of those Iranians, interfering in the internal affairs of another country!) Bush delivered an ultimatum to Iran: accept our terms or suffer the consequences. Quite frankly, he reminded me of the declaration of martial law read by Kodos the Executioner, governor of the planet Tarsus 4, on Star Trek. Too obscure? How about Margaret Hamilton on her broomstick high over Oz, threatening Dorothy et al. with some remarkably readable skywriting? No? Anyway, it was grimly amusing to see Bush and the German Chancellor stand up there and deplore aggression. Seems to me neither Germany nor the U.S. has a lot of credibility on that topic, but anyway….
Then there was the dreaded North Koreans and their mighty missile of death. The way the administration talks, you’d think it was the only ICBM on the planet. Jesus, how many times have we test-launched missiles capable of reaching North Korea? And while you’re working on that one, think about the likelihood that more than a few of our thousands of nuclear tipped ICBMs (all on launch-ready status) are targeted on Pyongyang. This is not idle speculation or paranoia — this is a very real danger from their perspective, made worse by 1.) our general bellicosity 2.) our deployment of “missile defense” batteries around the Pacific rim, and 3.) the fact that we flattened North Korea entirely once before within living memory. Pyongyang’s nuclear arsenal, on the other hand, consists of maybe one or more bombs (and maybe none at all), plus a missile the last version of which failed during a test in 1998.
In truth, by foaming at the mouth over this missile test, we are only helping Kim Jong Il further convince the subjects of his hermit kingdom that he’s making the West tremble.
