"Only dull people are brilliant at breakfast" -Oscar Wilde |
"The liberal soul shall be made fat, and he that watereth, shall be watered also himself." -- Proverbs 11:25 |
First, before we get into it, anyone else notice that the president said "Democrat Party" instead of "Democratic Party" even though the written text of his speech read "Democratic Party?" In other words, the president deliberately strayed from his prepared remarks just so he could work in a veiled insult. This is the president who never improvises during his public addresses (gaffes don't count as improv).
It pretty much negated all of his phony-baloney kudos to Speaker Pelosi, as well as his pledge to "cross that aisle" in the spirit of bipartisanship. It was kind of like saying to your wife, "I love those shoes. They make you look way sexy. Yeah. I'll call you from my cell when I leave the Spearmint Rhino. Bye!"
Down to it. Of all the remarks by the president, the one that stuck with me the most was the following:
"We are sending an additional 4,000 United States Marines, with orders to find the terrorists and clear them out."
Finding the terrorists and clearing them out. Right. What's the old maxim? Picking gnat shit out of pepper? This represents the same kind of simplified language the president has employed since the beginning of all of this -- the same sloganeering that shoved us into Iraq without a plan to win and get out. Go in there and get 'em, Private Stretch! That's the plan. No details as to how our soldiers might identify "the terrorists" as opposed to "the non-terrorists." This is the brand of euphemistic, misleading silliness that leads certain Americans (Hannity) to believe that it's still a winnable war: all we need to do is lasso the bunch of them. No reprisals, no collateral damage, no blowback. Clear them out. That's it.