Well I crossed my fingers, prayed REALLY hard, knocked on wood, threw some salt over my shoulder to ward off the devil and be darned if he didn't get reelected anyway! Evidently he was reelected because he's such a 'cute' cowboy. What does this tell me about my fellow country men and women? Basically, that the abomination of political correctness that keeps us from discussing politics has vastly lowered our requirements for the highest political office in our country.
Let's take a look at the American concept of cowboy. There are a number of different types of cowboys but we're only going to touch on two here. There's the urban cowboy that tries to walk the walk and talk the talk but under closer scrutiny the image falls completely apart. Instead of being an innate horseman and a true sage with the everyday wisdom we all need so badly the urban cowboy tries to copy the exterior of that sexy persona that women flock to and men want to mimic; but he doesn't have the depth or perception to back it up. Urban cowboys are the human equivalent of the fake store fronts on old western movies. The urban cowboy wants the power that goes with the image but can't handle the responsibility that comes with it.”
Will Rogers is a true portrayal of an American cowboy. True cowboys were about common sense. Nothing more, nothing less, just good old fashioned common sense. In other words don't cut your nose off to spite your face, don't leave the barn door open, or as Will Rogers himself so eloquently put it “Never kick a cow chip on a hot day.”
A true cowboy was loyal, thrifty, hard working, responsible, and wise. Range wars? A cowboy would be the first one to call. Circle the wagons and protect your own. Once the homestead is secure then you can go on the offensive. A true cowboy wasn't afraid to take care of what was his. Nor would he ask anyone to do anything he wasn't just as willing to do. Neither was he afraid to leave another alone if he wasn't aggravating him any. A true cowboy was too busy taking care of his own business to worry about the rest of the worlds, or maybe I should quote a notable (Will Rogers again folks) cowboy, “I don't care how little your country is, you got a right to run it like you want to. When the big nations quit meddling then the world will have peace.”
Now that we've established two different types of cowboys that are present in today's society let's take a look at what each one would have done after the event's of Sept. 11th, 2001. A Will Roger's cowboy would have looked around and immediately said close the borders and secure the country. Once the country was secure he would take a look at the different agenda's our country has been a party too in the Middle East and decided that, “Good judgment comes from experience, and a lot of that comes from bad judgment.” So let's clean up our borders and reevaluate our foreign policy in this region. Call out the Coast Guard, Navy and Marines to patrol our shores (Including the Great Lakes), the Army, National Guard, and Reserves to patrol our borders, and the Air Force to lend air support to all of the above. Then to use all the tools at hand the F.B.I would be activated to work closely with the C.I.A in determining how many sleeper cells we currently had in the country, while the C.I.A worked with Scotland Yard to bring international pressure to bear in getting our hands on the criminals that were responsible for the devastation. But the very first thing that would have been done would be to improve the safety of the American people and make sure this never happened again.
When I write the scenario of what an 'urban' cowboy would do after 9-11 it looks remarkably like what has happened. Let's be so confused and bumfuzzled by a challenge that instead of meeting it head-on we continue to read to elementary school children and give our advisor's a chance to scramble and tell us what our reaction is going to be. Then instead of doing anything remotely resembling useful let's stand around and point fingers at the intelligence community and whine about who didn't do what. In reality one of the men who DIED in the World Trade center had been a CIA analyst that told this administration and the one before it that this was going to happen. Only to get fired because they didn't want to listen to him. Of course instead of calling out our armed forces (Which I was under the mis impression, obviously, are there to protect US,) we dilly and dally about and then seize the day as a way to take some serious liberties with our civil liberties by way of the Patriot Act. Of course our cute urban cowboy is stamping around the Oval Office in his cowboy boots, fog horn in hand, screaming “We'll get those varmints by God, don't you worry your pretty little heads none, we'll get those varmints!” and having a high old time with his mellow drama and national Broadway show.
With all the posturing our urban cowboy has done since three thousand people died many things have been lost in the chaos. I'm certain that suits him just fine. It's called 'slight of hand'. When you don't want anyone to know what your true agenda is you distract them, in the hopes that maybe they just won't notice the little things. Like the fact that our borders are inadequately protected. Of course to adequately protect our borders he'd have to recall the posse he has deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan. That very same posse that is supposed to be protecting us is protecting his energy concerns in the Middle East though. So of course we can't do that now can we? (Notice the royal 'we' here folks). Especially if it makes us look like we don't have the first clue what we were supposed to do in the first place.
His mandate as our President is first and foremost to protect us from all threats. The tools we have entrusted to his use are the lives of all our daughters and sons, fathers, and mothers. We have been betrayed by our President. Our Armed Forces have been betrayed by their Commander-In-Chief. Please consider one more Will Rogers quote in closing, `Nowadays it is about as big a crime to be dumb as it is to be dishonest.'
Take it to heart. Get out there on the Internet and dig a little. Refuse to happily swallow the swill that we are spoon fed on a daily basis. Be open minded even if it is painful. Betrayal's always are. Educate yourself and those around you, including your children.
Elizabeth A. McCullough
Friday, November 19, 2004
Will Roger's quotes were found at this lovely site:
http://www.willrogers.org/
Vital information regarding illegal border crossings of 'OTM's (Other than Mexican's) can be found here:
http://www.azanderson.org/anderson_report_border_issues_gallery_of_graphics.htm
Talieson.com