Why Israel Matters?

The inept Obama administration and Ketchup Kerry once again burnished their mickey mouse Foreign Policy credentials when they snubbed the little country of Israel by getting the United Nations to call them a bad name. Now a lot of people seem to be upset about this. However, the pajama wearing youths in their parent’s basement are wondering what’s the big deal? After all, Israel is a really tiny country with a funny shape. Yeah, it’s like full of people who wear long beards

 and has some really hot female soldiers, 

but besides that, why should we care about them?

I decided to put together a list of why we should care to help the basement dwellers understand:

1. If you drilled a hole through the center of the earth from Israel,
   
   you would end up somewhere in the South Pacific between New Zealand and South America. There is literally nothing there besides thousands of miles of ocean and no people. Since water is really hard to dig through, there really is no reason to worry about the people of Israel digging through the center of the earth. I’d say for that reason alone leave them alone and let them dig as deep as they want to.

2. For the few kids that actually went to Sunday school, they will recall the story of the “Good Samaritan”. For those that didn’t, there is this guy who gets mugged and beat up. He must have been in the wrong area of town or something. On the other hand it was a really long time ago and in that part of the world, you’d get your butt kicked just by looking at someone wrong, unlike now where in that part of the world they just chop off your head or throw you off a building if you look at another guy wrong.

Anyway, this guy from the seamy side of the country (Samaria) comes upon this beat up guy, helps him to an AirBnB place, and pays the tab for the injured guy to be taken care of. Note the bible doesn’t say what the host charged for not only taking care of the injured guy, but also having to replace all the blood soaked sheets. My guess was it probably wasn’t enough, and the Samaritan’s ‘guest’ rating probably took a hit for that. The moral of that story is (I think) if you run a B&B, beware Samaritans bearing beat up people.

So what does all this have to do with Israel? Well that area of the world that was called ‘Samaria’ in bible times

 is now the exact area that the UN wants the country of Israel to give up so that those people can form their own country (sort of).

It sounds reasonable, right? For thousands of years, the people in Israel have not really liked those people. Why shouldn’t they have their own country? Yes, they used to be led by a guy that wore a white checkered scarf on his head that Hillary Clinton had killed,

 but that is not a good reason for them not to have their own country, am I right?

To get an answer to that you have to have just a little more knowledge. It turns out that about 70 years ago, there was this really big war. The bad guys in this war really didn’t like Jewish people and made it a policy to try to kill them all. When the US (USA! USA! USA!) beat those guys, they got to redraw all the maps of that part of the world. Since the Jewish people were almost wiped out, they drew in a country for them to have that is where a lot of the stuff in the bible said Jewish people did stuff.

About 20 years after that, the countries around Israel decided that since the Jewish people had made a pretty nice place of that area, they should have it. So they ganged up and tried to take over Israel. To make a short story shorter (the war lasted only like 6 days), the Israelis kicked their butts. In the process of beating all those other countries back, they established a new border that annexed the area was (sort of) Samaria. This was necessary so that tactically they would have the high ground should the other countries decide to gang up and hit them again. At that time they didn’t really care who was living there or what imaginary person they worshiped, as long as they stayed cool and didn’t try to kill the Jewish people.

Now fast forward 20 years. Over that time period, the people living in that area prospered. They sort of formed their own country and called themselves ‘Palestinians’. The originally wants to form their own country from the other country’s around there, like Jordan, Saudi Arabiaia, and other countries that have a lot of sand, but those countries said 'NO - this is our Sand Box! Go live somewhere else'. So the Palestinians carved out an area in Israel to live. The Israelis were like ‘OK, you can stay here but be cool’, and for a while things where OK.

Then they started wanting more and more, and the Israelis were like, ‘OK, you can set up your own government’, and they did. But then they started throwing rockets and bombs at the Israelis and saying bad things about them like the didn’t deserve to live. Since the countries around them still didn’t like the Israelis, they were like ‘Yeah! Stop oppressing those people!’. And that’s pretty much where things are today.

So why should we care about this beyond what the bible says, which a lot of people really don’t read or believe anymore? Well, to put it in terms even today’s young people can understand, it’s all about trying to keep the crazy people in that part of the world from bringing their crazy to our country. Israel is about the only true democracy in that part of the world. If they were not there, then that area would be destabilized and all kinds of crazy would leak out.

Truth be told, there is a lot of crazy leaking out already. With the war in Syria, there are already millions of refugees streaming out of that area to Europe. Along with people legitimately trying to get away from there, there are also some of the crazies coming along with them. Obama has allowed a lot of them into our country, probably along with their crazy uncles. These crazies are not crazy like your Uncle Peter who wore a dress to thanksgiving dinner last year. No, these are the crazies that will lop off crazy Uncle Peter’s head for wearing that dress (blue or otherwise). This is not a good thing, and will only be worse if Israel wasn’t there.

Ultimately Israel probably doesn’t really care what a bunch of foreign guys in New York with funny accents vote for. After all they have bikini clad Uzi toting hotties fighting on their side. What they do care about is the implicit knowledge that should they come under attack, the US (USA! USA! USA!) will come in and help they kick some ass. This is what makes Obama’s push to vote against them so concerning. Fortunately, he’s about done, and congress seems poised to tell all the New York diplomats with funny accents to go somewhere else and smoke their hookahs. When DJT takes over in a few weeks, he’ll maybe make it official. Way to (hopefully) go DJ!

1/4/17: Update!!!!
Wecome again to the site Moon Nukers! Take a few minutes to poke around and see what I have been up to in the 3 or 4 months since Harvey last gave me a link. Yeah, the answer to that one is probably not a lot, but I have been trying to give out some free ice cream almost daily now, so bookmark me and come on back occasionally for some more mindless drivel. It'll only hurt just a little!

Mirror, Mirror

As I have said previously, there seems to be a lot of hype about what Trump will do when he gets into office. Yes, he has promised to ‘build the wall’, and restore our relationship with Israel, and all manner of conservative goodies. In fact, there are few things that are being bandied about that he will do that I don’t like.

That doesn’t however mean that everything he does will be rainbows and smell like unicorn farts. In fact, every day it seems that his pre-election moves are increasingly becoming a mirror that the pundits look into to see those things which they fear and/or laud. For Trumpites, that mirror includes a fence on the border, and a prayer in every school. On the other side, the Obamist expect that on the day that he is sworn in, gulags will open where women and children who even vaguely appear to have a Hispanic lineage will be interred.  For conservative economist, it means a return to a booming economy, for liberals he will turn our fruited plains into vast industrial wastelands dedicated to the profits of faceless corporations. Conservative justice pundits expect him to appoint a ridged constitutional scholar to the Supreme Court, and liberals expect the appointment of Dirty Harry (or the actor who played Dirty Harry - not a bad choice!). Conservatives look for him to kill Obamacare, and liberals expect he will usher in an era of back alley abortions and the poor dying from lack of care.

What’s common in all these? Well, they all assume that since Trump is a Republican, he will champion all the items that are on every conservative agenda, and do all the things that the democrats fear. Neither I think will be our actual reality. Yes, Trumps cabinet appointments are encouraging signs. He has appointed (gasp) an EPA head that despises the EPA’s overreach (Scott Pruitt), a state department head that (gasp) is pro-business (Rex Tillerson), and an energy department head that champions (gasp) drilling for oil (Rick Perry). These all match up nicely to what we as conservatives hoped for in a Trump presidency, and simultaneously causes the heads of the liberals so used to seeing a liberal president push his vision of life in Amerika to spin like tops, wailing in despair. 

While favorable for conservatives, this is not the end. Have no doubt that he will do things that conservatives and classic liberals will despise. The world of politics is just too vast, and the big tent is just too multi-colored. However, I do think we are getting the president that we wanted. He is neither the Conservative God of conservative wet dream nor the Hitler that liberals fear. He does represent a monumental shift from the ultra-hard left stance that Obama has taken time after time. It’s understandable that our left leaning friends are despairing as this is not something they were ready for. It’s OK for them to retreat to their safe spaces and cower for a while, shrieking shrilly at Trump’s every utterance. We can only hope that as Trump settles into his presidential digs and begins to reverse the most onerous of Obama’s overreach, the cacophony of their teeth gnashing and posturing will get more tolerable. In the meantime, I am enjoying the tears of their disparagement. Does that make me a bad person?

To paraphrase R. Limbaugh, I hope Trump succeeds, and it’s ok, and even expected, that the liberals will hope that he fail. Let the games begin.

Words Fail Me

I don’t have a lot to say this sunny Friday. There are a great many things going right, and the Democrats are treating us to an entertaining reaction to the Hidabeast losing. 

That being said, there is one item I think is comment worthy. There is already starting to be a buzz about who Trump will tap for Scalia’s seat on the Supreme Court. A fairly popular choice seems to be Ted Cruz. I kind of agree to that. At 45, he is relatively young, so he would be able to sit for 25 years. As the puppy blender notes, he is a shoe in, given that he’ll get a courtesy approval from his fellows in the Senate.

On the other hand, let’s not forget what the Bamster did with his choices. Because of him, we have Kagan who replaced Stevens and Sotomayor who replaced Souter. Neither of these appointments probably should have been anywhere near the Supreme Court. They both were extemely left leaning, similar to Ginsberg. So why shouldn’t Trump go the same route and nominate a justice that leans equally to the right. 

While Cruz would more than fill that role, I do have an alternative, or perhaps a candidate for Trumps second or third nominee. What about Mark Levin? He is am undisputed constitutional scholar. It would also be entertaining to hear him tangle with Bamster’s appointees. Heck, it would be entertaining to hear him tangle with the Democrats and the Rinos during the confirmation hearings. The one downside of placing him would be his age (59) and his health. He has had some health issues, and probably would not endure on the court for more than 10 years. But, it would be entertaining none the less.

Hope-N-Changing Trump

Yesterday was rather euphoric for conservatives. I have to admit I didn’t even know that the Democrats had organized protest across the country, marching and burning things. Like most old white guys, I was celebrating Trump’s victory by pouring myself into my work and getting things done. Not that I’m surprised much by the deplorable marchers and burners. After all, temper tantrums are kind of what they do.

The one thing I did do yesterday was read and listen to a lot of comment about what Trump is going to do once he is sworn in. It occurred to me while I was listening the laundry list of things people wanted to see him do that this was reminiscent of the ‘hope-n-change’ Obama supporters were doing right after he got elected. I recall they were counting on him to make their car payments, get slave reparations, and turn back to tide of climate change. Note that I said 2008, because by 2012, everybody knew that he was just going through the motions and none of that stuff was going to happen.

It was interesting to hear what my fellow conservatives hoped for in a new Trump administration. Obviously the big things where there, repealing Obamacare and undoing all of those dreadful administrative actions like immigration amnesty. But it was striking how humble their wish list was. Mostly it was more of less, and less of more.

The gist of what I heard was the hope that the government will go back to having little or no impact on our daily lives. Ultimately that really is the promise of a conservative government. It really should endeavor to have as little impact on the everyday citizen as possible. Perhaps that is the most important thing that I see in my personal mirror when I look on a new Trump administration.

But perhaps there is a great deal of circumspection here. Conservatives have learned to not dream too big in the last eight years. There have been too many disappointments from our leadership. Recall how we felt we had a chance when we took back the house and the Senate, and yet not one bill repealing Obamacare ever landed on Obama’s desk for him to not sign? So there are still a too many worms in our congressional woodwork for us to even hope that great things will be done or great walls will be built (or rebuilt). 

No, I think we will be good when all the tiny cuts are healed. There are many examples of tiny things that we see on a daily basis that are a result of Obama policies that we would be happy for Trump to ‘fix’: like the TSA no longer groping grandma but applying sensible screening techniques; or pulling down all those stupid signs that are marking ‘shovel ready jobs’; or letting our kids have hamburgers in their school lunches again. Yeah – those kind of things.

And there I go, holding up my mirror while looking at the new Trump administration. And yet Trump has not done a single thing since getting elected beyond making a victory speech. None of this optimism is earned. And yet, like most conservatives, I still feel a little giddy. Perhaps it’s not so much about what he will do, as to what the Hildabeast won’t do. I think it's OK to feel good about that!

There really is a new sun rising over America, so have a great day!