Which storm shall we weather?
My mind makes weird connections sometimes -- like the one I made Tuesday between terrorism and the breathless local weather forecasting viewers get if there's a whisper of a possibility of a snowflake anywhere between Toledo and Lexington.
First, don't blame the TV weather persons for spending hours talking about a snowfall that appears most likely to bring an inch or two of fluffy stuff that will last half the day. Alas, it's like the old Pogo cartoon: "We have met the enemy and he is us." It's fashionable to make fun of television's obsession with boosting minor weather events into major stories, but the TV people have learned that viewers will watch and watch and watch. The same is true online.
So then I'm seeing President Bush explain in a news conference that even though the latest intelligence estimate about Iran seems to be the opposite of the last intelligence estimate about Iran, we should have confidence in his administration, and that nothing has really changed in his mind.
After processing the mind-numbing logic of that assertion, I begin thinking about terrorism. I recall how the 911 hijackers spent a lot of time in America, watching our television programs, observing how we live our lives and drawing conclusions about our society.
And I imagine them watching the reaction to mildly annoying weather in Cincinnati -- or any number of other places around the country. They might conclude that Americans are soft, that we've lost perspective about what's important, and that if we freak out over an inch of snow, we won't have the stomach to fight a real war.
Fortunately, it turns out we're tougher than that. But sometimes you wonder.
posted by Dennis Hetzel at 5:24 PM
5 Comments:
at 6:09 AM, December 05, 2007 
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at 2:09 AM, December 06, 2007 
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at 8:01 AM, December 06, 2007 
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at 7:14 PM, December 06, 2007 
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at 9:29 PM, December 10, 2007 
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Post a Comment*whats ironic about your column is that indeed we learn to adapt, or to pardon the phrase weather the situation.
here we have the bush crime family with bizzare announcements about duct tape and bottled water and a rainbow of terror threats which people have learned to ignore. and now we have furthur proof that george w bush is delusional, perhaps even mentally ill with his most recent pronoucements.
personally, i would rather have had al gore and four foot of snow then the nonsense that the neocons have dished up for the past seven years.
6:09. take your meds and watch CNN
Hillary won't win and Gore is a media reclamation.
Are we tougher than that? Or do we just have more military might? They're not the same. I don't see one sign amongst the general population that they are willing to sacrifice one iota in the way of fuel conservation, or the ability to save money, etc. We are, as a nation, big, bloated, and out of touch.
Of course, we have no tough leadership willing to guide, chastize, encourage or generally provide the vision needed to get through our current national crises.
So are we weak - you betcha! The irony, though, is that we are commuting huge distances, sleep deprived, overwrought about which schools will accept our children, etc., so we FEEL tough and overextended. If our homes were bombed, our families dispersed, our electricity cut off and other true nightmares, we'd crumble like a stale Christmnas cookie.
Wake up, people. Water seeks its own level and we have more than everyone else in the world. There will be an equalizing whether it's voluntary or effected through warfare. So instead of pushing those children around in the mega-strollers, dear soccer moms, you'd better be thinking about the implications of perpetual war with a perpetual draft. Or if they're lucky, your children may get a crappy job at Walmart, with Dickensian working conditions if the Waltons can maybe get Congress to roll back child labor laws.........
Jay Bookman has a great column about this today:
The president's policy toward Iran — harsh, threatening and dismissive of any chance at negotiation — was supposedly founded on the belief that Iran was pursuing nuclear weapons and had to be stopped. All options, including force, had to be on the table to prevent that calamity from occurring.
We've now learned that the premise behind that policy has been incorrect, that Iran actually abandoned its nuclear weapons program four years ago. In light of that startling discovery, the Bush administration says that from now on its policy toward Iran will be... harsh, threatening and dismissive of any chance at negotiation, exactly what it had always been. Nothing changes.
Because as President Bush said in a press conference Tuesday, "What's to say they couldn't start another nuclear weapons program?"
Once again, it seems, facts can be rearranged to suit the policy, but policy is seldom rearranged to suit the facts.
"Mind-numbing logic" is a hallmark of this president/administration - 13 more months! Hang in there.
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