1 Boring Old Man

Israeli troops push into south Lebanon

In mental health circles, we have a term – passive aggressive. It essentially means doing something that is hostile [aggressive] by non-action, thereby denying responsibility for the aggression. Examples are everywhere – like being late, giving some benign excuse instead of admitting that you didn’t want to be there in the first place. But our current non-action in the Middle East crisis [explained by Bush, Rice, and Bolton as having no meaning] is a fine example. Our Administration wants to squash Hamas and Hezbollah more than anything, but can’t think of any way to do it. So when Israel goes at Hezbollah with an elephant gun, we do nothing. It’s a very aggressive stance, our doing nothing.

Nothing may well be the exact right thing to do, but that’s not why we’re doing it. As the intoxicated, role-gobbling Mr. Bush said to Tony Blair, "What they need to do is get Syria to get Hizbollah to stop doing this shit, and it’s over…" Right! That’s what they need to do. What’s amazing is that Bolton, Rice, and Bush are the action figure dolls of the century, yet right now, they’re suddenly just all out of ideas. If we’re going to support Israel’s War, please say it. Don’t sit around playing dumb. Bolton was the worst. He asks, "How do you have a cease fire with Terrorists?" It’s not that hard. Cease firing!

I have no earthly idea what’s the right thing to do in the Middle East, but I’d sure like to have a government that was being straight about what we are doing instead of one that trumps up a false reason [to invade Iraq] or plays dumb [as a way of allying with Israel’s war in Lebanon with Hezbollah].

At least, Israel is being out front about what they’re doing. Bush never is. The universal message is that we, the people, don’t need to know what’s going on for national security reasons…