
 |
|
May 24, 2013
May 22, 2013
John Thorne:
They launched the 'Arab Spring' but now yearn for the good old days of a strongman
May 20, 2013
Richard A. Serrano: Is Meir Kahane's assassin now a changed man?
Melissa Healy: Genetic copies of living people from embryos no longer science fiction
Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : Jews Inducted into Rock Hall of Fame; Anton Yelchin co-stars in New "Trek" film; Kutcher (but not Kunis) visits Israel; Jewish TV Star Praises Jewish Rap Star
The Kosher Gourmet by Cathy Pollak: WARNING: This WALNUT CAKE WITH PRALINE FROSTING, perfect for afternoon coffee, is addicting
May 13, 2013
Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo: Why the giving of the document that would permanently change the world could only be done in desolation
David G. Savage: Church-state, literally? Supreme Court weighing public school graduation in a church
May 10, 2013
Rabbi Berel Wein: Be all that you should be
May 8, 2013
Peter Ford: Why China is welcoming both Israel's Netanyahu and Palestinians' Abbas
Warren Richey: Obama administration quietly backs out of appeal over new contraceptive mandate
Fred Weir: At Kerry-Putin meeting, US-Russia relations thaw --- a tad
The Kosher Gourmet by Leela Cyd Ross : Almost too pretty to eat, this colorful salad with Sicilian inspiration will tickle the taste buds and delight your visual sensibility
May 6, 2013
May 3, 2013
Kids, kittens the Same? With employee perks at struggling Internet pioneer Yahoo! it's hard to tell
Sandy Kleffman: Artificial kidney offers hope to patients tethered to a dialysis machine
April 29, 2013
Roy Gutman: Poland's new Jewish museum celebrates life, doesn't revisit Holocaust
Mark Clayton: Terrorism in America: Is US missing a chance to learn from failed plots?
Kim Murphy: Boston Bomber's 'Svengali' Revealed
Pete Spotts: Tiny satellites + cellphones = cheaper 'eyes in the sky' for NASA
April 26, 2013
Clifford D. May: Defense in the Age of Jihadist Terrorism
Sharon Palmer, R.D.: How to feel your best -- with plenty of energy, a healthy weight and optimal mental and physical function -- without driving yourself batty
April 24, 2013
|
| |
Jewish World Review
Dec. 1, 2006
/ 10 Kislev, 5767
The strategy FDR never thought of
By
Wesley Pruden
| 
|
|
|
|
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
Piling on is fun, as every schoolboy remembers from grammar-school recess. The trick is to be one of the pilers and not the pilee, and never get crushed at the bottom of the pile.
George W. Bush is the boy at the bottom of the pile, taking the weight of insult, affront and other abuse from assorted connivers, blowhards and corporation lawyers looking for clients.
Kendall Myers, a self-styled "expert" on U.S.-British relations and an adjunct professor i.e., a part-timer without serious academic credentials at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, told a seminar that "the special relationship" between the United States and Britain, the foundation of victory in two world wars and triumph in the twilight struggle of a protracted Cold War, is "totally one-sided" in America's favor, that Washington has no respect for the British, that Britain's role as a bridge between the United States and Europe "is disappearing before our eyes." All George W.'s fault, naturally.
There's piling on from an old source of opportunists. The State Department is infested with "analysts" and "advisers" eager to call almost any president "arrogant" and "stupid" and "ignorant," and particularly this one, ostensibly for his war policy in Iraq but actually for his reluctance to take seriously the lose-lose nostrums that flourish like E. coli bacteria in Foggy Bottom. Mr. Myers' superiors called him in for a talk, and he will presumably be told not to let the door hit him in the butt on his way out.
Or maybe not. Such behavior is not unknown in Foggy Bottom. Only a month or so ago another State Department noodnik, eager to get on television, any television, told an interviewer for Al Jazeera, the preferred medium of Middle East terrorists, that the United States i.e., George Bush had displayed not only "arrogance" but "stupidity" in Iraq. He, too, was disciplined, but after making a full grovel he was allowed to stay on the public payroll.
The Hollywood rants, which mostly illustrate the mindless vulgarity that now defines the popular culture, are aimed to entertain, certainly not persuade, and Danny DeVito, who has made a movie career of appearing as costume jewelry worn by actresses twice his height and half his weight, showed up drunk to wow Barbara Wawa & Co. with a story about his fun trashing of the Lincoln Bedroom as a guest of the fabulous Clintons, followed by a rambling rant about George W. that was so vulgar that half of it had to be bleeped out.
But more serious piling on is on the way. The bipartisan Iraq Study Group, commissioned by Congress to find a way to dispense with the war in Iraq and led by the man who helped George W.'s daddy save Saddam Hussein in the first Iraq war, will report next week that it deplores what's going on in Iraq, but hasn't a clue about what to do about it.
The panelists said they would report to Congress next Wednesday and in the meantime were warned by co-chairmen James Baker and Lee Hamilton that they were not under any circumstances to tell anyone what was in the report. So of course some of them did. What's the point of knowing stuff in Washington if you can't tell everybody about it?
Everyone is told to expect a recommendation that Iran and Syria be invited to assist the coalition of the willing in extracting the West from Iraq. We won't be told how the enemy can help, since nobody knows. A pity FDR and Winston Churchill didn't think about a strategy like this in early 1942. Half of us might be speaking German now (and the other half Japanese). The panel, according to the New York Times, will suggest withdrawing 15 combat brigades from Iraq and sending them to unspecified bases in neighboring countries where they would be responsible for protecting the Americans remaining in Iraq. It's not clear how they would do this, perhaps by conducting seminars led by adjunct professors at Johns Hopkins, beamed into Iraq by Al Jazeera.
Wisdom sometimes slips out of the mouths not only of babes, but of fools. "I think we've played a constructive role," said one person identified by the New York Times as "involved" in the committee's deliberations, "but from the beginning we've worried that this entire agenda could be swept away by events." Reality can do that.
Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.
JWR contributor Wesley Pruden is editor in chief of The Washington Times. Comment by clicking here.
Wesley Pruden Archives
© 2006 Wesley Pruden
|
|

Arnold Ahlert
Mitch Albom
Jay Ambrose
Michael Barone
Barrywood
Lori Borgman
Stratfor Briefing
Mona Charen
Linda Chavez
Richard Z. Chesnoff
Ann Coulter
Greg Crosby
Larry Elder
Suzanne Fields
Christine Flowers
Frank J. Gaffney
Bernie Goldberg
Jonah Goldberg
Julia Gorin
Jonathan Gurwitz
Paul Greenberg
Argus Hamilton
Victor Davis Hanson
Betsy Hart
Ron Hart
Nat Hentoff
A. Barton Hinkle
Jeff Jacoby
Paul Johnson
Jack Kelly
Ch. Krauthammer
David Limbaugh
Kathryn Lopez
Rich Lowry
Michelle Malkin
Jackie Mason
Ann McFeatters
Dale McFeatters
Dana Milbank
Jeanne Moos
Dick Morris
Jim Mullen
Deroy Murdock
Judge A. Napolitano
Bill O'Reilly
Clarence Page
Kathleen Parker
Star Parker
Dennis Prager
Wesley Pruden
Tom Purcell
Sharon Randall
Robert Robb
Cokie & Steve Roberts
Heather Robinson
Debra J. Saunders
Martin Schram
Greg Schwem
Culture Shlock
David Shribman
Roger Simon
Lenore Skenazy
Michael Smerconish
Thomas Sowell
Ben Stein
Mark Steyn
John Stossel
Cal Thomas
Dan Thomasson
Bob Tyrrell
Diana West
Dave Weinbaum
George Will
Walter Williams
Byron York
ZeitGeist
Mort Zuckerman

Robert Arial
Chuck Asay
Baloo
Lisa Benson
Chip Bok
Dry Bones
John Branch
John Cole
J. D. Crowe
Matt Davies
John Deering
Brian Duffy
Everything's Relative
Mallard Fillmore
Glenn Foden
Jake Fuller
Bob Gorrel
Walt Handelsman
Joe Heller
David Hitch
Jerry Holbert
David Horsey
Lee Judge
Steve Kelley
Jeff Koterba
Dick Locher
Chan Lowe
Jimmy Margulies
Jack Ohman
Michael Ramirez
Rob Rogers
Drew Sheneman
Kevin Siers
Jeff Stahler
Scott Stantis
Danna Summers
Gary Varvel
Kirk Walters
Dan Wasserman

Tech Q&A
Mr. Know-It-All
Ask Doctor K
Richard Lederer
Frugal Living
On Nutrition
Bookmark These
Bruce Williams
|