CSotD: Getting The Pig Over the Stile
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The world faces a decision. Or the president does. Somebody seems to, but Trump’s allies and supporters appear to be on more solid ground than he is. They’re divided on whether to attack Iran, but they’re certain that they’ll line up behind whatever Dear Leader decides.
It’s just not clear that he’s going to decide anything.
Maybe he’ll decide everything. Throughout his presidencies, Dear Leader has continuously promised to reveal his decision in two weeks, which is a good example of consistent leadership but seems reminiscent of Achilles and the tortoise, always approaching the finish line but never quite getting there.
We don’t know when the two weeks will be over, but maybe there will come a moment when all those promises are fulfilled at once. I picture something like the Rapture or possibly the climax of that folk tale of the Old Woman and the Pig:
The cat began to kill the rat; the rat began to gnaw the rope; the rope began to hang the butcher; the butcher began to kill the ox; the ox began to drink the water; the water began to quench the fire; the fire began to burn the stick; the stick began to beat the dog; the dog began to bite the pig; the little pig in a fright jumped over the stile; and so the old woman got home that night.
It just doesn’t seem like it should be so complicated.
It didn’t used to be, unless our historical perspective ignores a lot of diddling and stalling. But much as people disliked Madison’s handling of the War of 1812, they seemed pleased with Monroe’s somewhat belligerent challenge that followed, and, similarly, lined up behind Truman.
There’s a certain element of “You had one job” involved in the presidency. However much it may have evolved over the past 250 years or so, the chief executive is supposed to lead, to make decisions, to set the mark around which legislation and judgement flow.
If the old woman had been a more effective administrator, the pig would have jumped over the stile right away and she wouldn’t have needed to go begging and wheedling all those others for their help in making her authority stick.
Trump is not simply indecisive but a prisoner of his own ego. We had a treaty with Iran, a masterfully constructed multi-national agreement that was working until Dear Leader pulled out for reasons that seem no more rational than Chappatte suggests.
Trump seemed determined to go it alone, and not only abandoned that deal but pulled us out of the Paris Accord on climate change and keeps threatening to leave NATO. The idea of cooperating with other nations seems to offend him, and his notion of strength seems to involve acting alone in a way that strikes other nations not as strength but as arrogance.
Now, with his MAGA supporters torn over the question of intervention or isolationism, Trump has declared himself the arbiter of what “America First” means: “Well, considering that I’m the one that developed ‘America First,’ and considering that the term wasn’t used until I came along, I think I’m the one that decides that.”
Which is utterly ridiculous, given that he was born two or three decades after the pro-Hitler bunds in this country used the term to describe their system.
He might as well claim to have invented the telephone.
But we are being invited to the dance, and, given the missiles that have flown so far, Díaz Yanes suggests that destroying peace is a group effort, not just one side choosing to attack the other.
It leaves Trump with a choice to make. We’ll see if he can pluck the final feather from the dove in two weeks.
Zyglis is not the only observer to suspect that falling approval ratings, which he denies, and growing opposition to his Big Beautiful Bogus Budget have motivated Trump to seize on the distraction of Iran’s impending creation of nuclear arms.
Which has been impending for quite a while, as Turner notes, and his marginal wisecrack that Iran’s nuclear arms are hidden with Saddam’s Weapons of Mass Destruction echoes a feeling among many observers that we’re being hornswoggled once again.
Juxtaposition of the Day
A pair of Dutch cartoonists both seize upon the pulling down of Saddam’s statue as a symbol, with the Ayatollah about to be tumbled. But while Wolterink hails it as the freeing of the Iranian people, Schot reminds us how the previous “liberation” worked out.
Joe Heller declares that evil, swarthy Iran does indeed have the bomb or is very close to obtaining it.
Iran has done little to endear itself to the West, not only repressing its own people but financing terrorism elsewhere and having permitted its Revolutionary Guard to commit acts of piracy and harassment in the Gulf. It does make the country an inviting target.
Summers assures us that Iran is on its last legs and doesn’t pose a formidable foe, which shouldn’t be of much comfort for those who remember how quickly Saddam Hussein’s government fell and what happened after that quick, superficial strike.
The number of people who died between the invasion of Iraq and Saddam’s execution might be encouraging, but the number who died in the aftermath, and the invasion’s impact throughout the region, should give us pause.
Walters explains that victory will be simple, comparing the last days of Hitler to what he estimates will be the last days of Khamenei, though he neglects to mention that Hitler’s death in a bunker was preceded by some 419,000 American deaths and roughly 85 million deaths overall.
But, yes, Hitler died in a bunker. That’s all the history we need to know before making a decision.
Perhaps we’re already tangled up and being drawn, once again, into a land war in Asia, which even the foolish villain in Princess Bride knew was a classic blunder.
We’ll find out who else knows that. Or, at least, who cares about such things.
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