Threats More Than Existential (Now That's Some Kind Of Scary)

Believe it or not I watched the Republican debates the other nite (well more than half of it, I stopped watching for a few minutes once to do something useful). I have been writing about anger a lot recently but kind of took a break. These candidates reminded me of why I had been doing that. With the notable exception of Ron Paul these folks are extremely bellicose. The subject was foreign policy and these guys pretty much advocate bullying the rest of the world around until they fall in line with us.

I think the stupid quote of the nite has to go to Michelle Bachmann who described the threat posed by Al-Qaeda as "more than existential." I wonder what are they going to do, kill us then follow us into the afterlife and kill us again? Just how does a threat become more than existential? But hey, she was not the only fear monger up there. All of them but Ron Paul seem to have a hankering to attack Iran. They are already building their grudges. I didn't hear the Hitler comparison yet but it cannot be far away.

They did engage in various fantasy scenarios of just how dangerous Iran is. Governor Perry wants to start a no fly zone over Syria. That's a sneaky way of saying he wants to start an air war over Syria. That's what we do to places we intend to invade. The Governor and the rest of them seemed to be on some kind of testosterone binge, even Ms. Bachmann felt the need to show gargantuan her testicles are.

Stirring up fear and talking up violent fantasies and then bragging about how awesomely powerful our military is. It just seems crazy to me! I don't think the Democrats are any better unfortunately. They say pretty much the same shit.

We are winding down supposedly, from the longest war in our history. But we have swarms of flying robots all over the world ready to kill at the touch of a button. Our military budget is not only the largest in the world its larger than the rest of the world's combined! Meanwhile our leaders seem to have a vision of perpetual war, fueled by never ending fantasies about threats that are "more than existential."


Russell