I voted against Barack Obama twice, & I volunteered a score of hours to the Romney-Ryan ticket last year in order to help defeat the president's bid for re-election. Mr. Obama's foreign policy (or lack of same) has been a disaster for the United States & the wider world; only now, as he & his incompetent advisors thrash from one half-baked response to another over the uncivil civil war in Syria, has the American public & the wider world begun to see him as the feckless amateur I've always known him to be. (Our great nation's impotence & incoherence over the disintegration of Syria, the chaos in Egypt, Iran's pursuit of the atom bomb, & many other issues throughout the Middle East & beyond is just one piece of the "parade of horrors" about which I've been warning & lamenting since Inauguration Day 2009.) It is with trepidation & the near certainty of regret that I find myself in common cause with President Obama, Vice President Biden (against whom I voted twice, as Mr. Obama's running mate), & Secretary Kerry (against whom I voted in '04), et al., against the majority of my fellow Republicans & the majority of my fellow Americans, at least according to all the polling I've seen/heard. We must act in Syria: to punish the use of chemical weapons & deter their future use; to end the civil war that has claimed well over one hundred thousand lives in the last two & a half years & created millions of refugees & internally displaced; to topple the Syrian Arab Republic, a persistent foe of both the United States of America & our closest regional ally, the State of Israel; to strip the Islamic Republic of Iran of its closest regional ally; & to ensure that a post-Assad Syria does not fall under the sway of any of the several competing al-Qaeda affiliates currently campaigning in the country. Though as recently as yesterday I prayed for peace, I have concluded that force of arms is the only way to affect meaningful change & stave off a yet greater humanitarian disaster.
"Let all that you do be done in love."
1 Corinthians 16:14
I shall watch Mr. Obama's address this evening in the sincere hope that he exceeds my expectations & lays out a clear & persuasive casus belli. If we shirk our common duty now, if we shrink before the perceived difficulty of our calling, we shall all suffer the dire consequences—a more chaotic, more savage, less humane, & less secure world. There is no primary source evidence that the great Edmund Burke ever said or wrote the words widely attributed to him, "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing," but those words remain true nonetheless.
The Rebel Black Dot Song of the Day
Fountains of Wayne, "Bright Future in Sales" from Welcome Interstate Managers (T.L.A.M.)
Commentary: "Bright Future in Sales" was in my head as I lay awake last night, & was still there this morning. As I sweated through the reportedly hottest day of the year, I considered switching the R.B.D.S.O.T.D. to something about the lingering summer's heat. In the end, as you can see, considerations less of the exact moment prevailed in favor of "Bright Future in Sales."
The well-worn, still true chorus:
"And if I make it home alive—
"I'm gonna get my shit together,
'Cause I can't live like this forever…"
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