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Sunday, September 23, 2007

Hibernation for Da Bears 

Tonight's Bears-Cowboys game was downright painful. The game started out promisingly, but everything went downhill for the Bears after Rex Grossman's first interception of the night.

As much as I like to blame Grossman for all the Bears' ills, the truth is that the entire team fell apart. Bernard Berrian dropped a lot of passes that would have resulted in big gains. Tony Romo & company wore down the Bears' once-feared defense. Several key defensive players like Nathan Vasher & Lance Briggs went down with injuries, joining the ranks of Mike Brown & Dusty Dvoracek.

It appears that the "hangover" affecting Super Bowl losers in in full effect in Chicago this season. I think the Bears will be lucky to make the playoffs, and I even think that the Green Bay Packers will win the NFC North.

Coach Lovie Smith and General Manger Ted Phillips would be wise to write this season off as one of rebuilding. It's clear that Rex Grossman is not the QB who will lead the Bears to a championship. As much as I like Brian Griese, he's probably too old to be a franchise quarterback for the Bears. I'd like to see the Bears give Kyle Orton some more playing time and develop his potential. Orton played very conservatively during the 2005 season, and while he heavily favored the rush over the pass play, his avoidance of mistakes would be a breath of fresh
air after Rex Grossman's turnover-plagued performances.

Tuesday, September 11, 2007

Tuesday 

Of all the 9/11 anniversaries, perhaps this year holds the most significance of all. The 9/11 attacks occurred on a Tuesday, and this will be the first time the anniversary has fallen on a Tuesday. Do you remember where you were on that fateful Tuesday, when the carnage played out on the world stage?

For that matter, what will you be doing this Tuesday? Like the firefighters and police and the airline passengers of Flight 93 who stormed the cockpit, are you prepared to exercise uncommon courage in the face of uncommon disaster? Preparedness is something we all like to believe we have, but we can never be prepared enough for the most horrific and trying of emergencies.

How is your life different on this Tuesday, September 11, compared to the last one? Are you more aware of the nations and the peoples around us? Are you burdened by additional security and law enforcement procedures? Have you lost a loved one in this global war against the jihadists? Has your entire perspective on life and the world changed?

Yet again, on Tuesday, September 11, America stands at the precipice. Six years ago, we were attacked in a plot that culminated from the collapse of Afghanistan, once occupied by the Soviet Union. Today we hear testimony from the greatest military leader (General David Petraeus) and one of the greatest diplomats (Ambassador Ryan Crocker) that we currently have. America must choose whether to abandon Iraq and end America's bloodshed in the near-term, or to hang on in a bitter struggle to stabilize that country and prevent a repeat of the Soviet withdrawal, the Afghan Civil Wars, and the 9/11 attacks. America will have to choose between myopic expediency and the uncertain effort to learn history's bitter lessons.

The way to spend this Tuesday, though, is remembrance and reflecting. The lost souls will be mourned and the heroes will be praised. Freedom will be cherished, but the fire of vigilance must burn eternally.

America's center of gravity is its people. America can only be beaten when its people choose defeat. I choose victory, and I hope that Americans love their liberties enough to choose victory as well. We must keep our eyes open, our ears clear, and stay on the alert for anybody who seeks to deprive Americans of their lives or their freedoms.

Monday, September 10, 2007

Of all the things that bother me, few are as disturbing as the way General David Petraeus has been treated by opponents of the Iraqi War. This is a man who has devoted his life towards the service of our nation, and he was approved to be the commander of US forces in Iraq without a dissenting vote in the US Senate. While people have every right to disagree with what he has to say, they should hear him out and express their qualms in a civil way. Everything I have seen thus far has been ugly.

It began on Friday with several prominent Democratic lawmakers accusing Petraeus of being the White House's stooge and referring to his undelivered report as "The Bush Report." The offenders included Senators Dick Durbin & Harry Reid, and Representatives Nancy Pelosi & Chris Van Hollen. A slightly more civil disagreement came from Senator Joe Biden on the Sunday talk shows.

The actions of the liberal activists today made the actions by elected Democrats over the weekend look respectful by comparison. MoveOn.org took out a full page ad in the New York Times for the purpose of mocking "General Betray Us." The General's testimony was repeatedly interrupted by protesters. Members of Code Pink were escorted out of the Capitol, and Cindy Sheehan was arrested yet again.

What kind of example are these liberals setting? I thought that it was "liberal" to disagree with people without resorting to character assassination. I also thought that these so-called liberals believed in the free expression of all ideas, and didn't believe in shouting down the people they disagreed with. If a liberal were treated the same way that General Petraeus was, he or she would certainly be crying "censorship" by now.

Perhaps my impression of yesteryear's America is tainted with rosy glasses, but today's insults of the best general currently serving in our armed forces make me believe that the level of discourse in our society has coarsened. Partisans of all stripes will care about the freedom of ideas, but only as long as they're ideas they agree with.

Sunday, September 09, 2007

The Beginnings of an Unbearable Season 

If the Bears' opening day loss to the Chargers is any indication, this season is going to be a tough one for Bears fans.

On the positive side, the Bears defense held the Chargers to two touchdowns and shut down the most explosive running back in the NFL, LaDanian Tomlinson. They also held the passing game of Phil Rivers under 80 yards.

Offensively, the Bears raise nothing but questions. The play-calling by offensive coordinator Ron Turner was uninspired and insipid. The promotion of Cedric Benson as lead running back seems to have been in error, making Bears fans say that the running game would have looked respectable today if only they hadn't traded away Thomas Jones. Quarterback Rex Grossman is still a huge question mark, with a critical interception on the Chargers' 1-yard line and a fumble to his credit.

The conventional wisdom is that the Bears would at least make the playoffs this season, if for no other reason than the weak NFC North division. But with the Lions, packers & Vikings all winning today, a Bears playoff appearance is not a foregone conclusion.

The Bears may be a playoff-quality team, but they are not a Super Bowl-quality team this season. While the Bears lost a game to the Chargers (one of the league's top teams, along with the Patriots and Colts,) they didn't look very good offensively in doing so. The Bears best hope (one which will never come to pass, in the real world) may be trading quarterback Rex Grossman for a running back who can carry the team into the playoffs and perhaps the Super Bowl. The Bears have a perfectly capable QB in Brian Griese, who lacks Grossman's penchant for dropping snaps. But if the Bears don't make some kind of drastic change very soon, it's going to be a very dull January in Chicago.

Saturday, September 08, 2007

Eternal Vigilence in the Face of Terror 

A terrorist attack against the US homeland is imminent.

In Osama bin Laden's video, he extols Americans to convert to Islam. The significance of this statement is that Muslims are supposed to give their enemies a chance to convert to Islam before killing them. One of the reasons why bin Laden was condemned for the 9/11 attacks is because he gave the American people no such ultimatum before unleashing the attack. Neither did he seek a fatwa from an Islamic scholar of sufficient authority. Bin Laden allegedly received the authority for a future mass-casualty attack in 2003. His ultimatum to convert to Islam completes the warning cycle.

There's no guarantee that an attack will come in a day, a month, a year, or even a decade. All we know is that bin Laden and his ilk are exceedingly patient. They view the current, global war between the west and the Islamists as part of a thousand-year struggle that began with the First Crusade.

Our enemies can wait another thousand years and waste millions of lives in order to see our destruction. The challenge that America and the rest of the industrialized world faces is to outlast our enemies for as long as it takes for the threat to subside. As much as people want to deny it, we are only in the opening stages of a battle between civilizations. It will be fought with ideas just as much as it will be fought with bullets and bombs. But all Americans must know that part of the physical battle will be fought on our own soil, and it can only be won through the vigilance of common Americans, working in conjunction with our law enforcement agencies and first responders.

Friday, September 07, 2007

Osama bin Laden joins MoveOn.Org? 

In Osama bin Laden's newest message, one of his polemics blasts the Democrats for not doing enough to get the US out of Iraq. He sounds much like liberal groups such as MoveOn.Org, who want their party to end the war, regardless of that party's inability to override a presidential veto.

There are many on the left who argue that al Qaeda wants the US to stay in Iraq. Their logic is that Iraq is a trap which allows al Qaeda to kill Americans, and it generates sympathy for their cause. But this mentality is ignorant of al Qaeda's overriding objectives. For al Qaeda, killing Americans is not a goal unto itself; it's a means to an end. Al Qaeda wants to remove all that is un-Islamic from the middle east. So while the terror group might enjoy the killing of infidels, keeping the indidels around for a prolonged period defeats their actual purpose.

Further, al Qaeda seeks to remove the westerners and their influences from the middle east because they perceive the west as a supporter and enabler of corrupt, secular governments in their nations. As long as the House of Saud and other corrupt Arab despots continue oppressing the people through secret police and political prisons, al Qaeda will have all the recruiting power it needs.

In the Islamic mindset, fighting "the near enemy" has always been more important than fighting "the far enemy." For years, Islamists waged war against Arab secularists and Israel, while bottling their seething anger against Europe and America. Osama bin Laden's ambition was to strike "the far enemy," and he captured the imaginations of thousands, perhaps millions, of angry Muslims by doing so.

On September 11th, 2001, Osama bin Laden struck a blow against the American people. While there is no warrior's honor in a sneak attack against an unarmed opponent, it fits with bin Laden's standard procedure. His messages since have largely been directed squarely at the American people. He mocks America's politicians, because he believes that the American people can be swayed to his side. Bin Laden believes, and rightly so, that the American electorate is America's "center of gravity," in military parlance. He thinks that, though a combination of persuasive argument and violent coercion, he can convince the American voters to choose a government that will completely withdraw from the middle east.

Yet the problems with bin Laden's strategy are numerous. Since the 9/11 attacks, America has grown more vigilant, and made it more difficult for bin Laden to employ violent coercion within the American homeland. America's military has restricted bin Laden's public appearances, making it more difficult for him to craft any kind of message. His understanding of American society is drawn largely from leftist books like "Rogue State," rather than exposure to American culture.

Impossible Scissors would also like to warn Osama to be careful what he wishes for. I have two words to describe a middle east that America has totally withdrawn from: totally fucked. The middle east is a festering pot of ethnic and religious conflicts that is held together by the most delicate of threads: western petrodollars. If America and its allies had nothing to do with the middle east, the region would explode into multiple regional wars, with rampant poverty and abundant ethnic and religious cleansing.

Any objective observer will have to admit that while western involvement in the middle east isn't perfect, it has brought some benefits to the people of that region. Extremists like Osama bin Laden will have to learn that you can't have it both ways, and you'll have to accept the bad with the good. For the people of the middle east, they will never be able to escape the western influence until virtues like tolerance, education, and economic diversification are widely embraced.

Tuesday, September 04, 2007

A Rumor of War? 

There have been many rumors circulating that the US is preparing a "shock and awe" campaign of several days that would target the armed forces of Iran. According to these rumors, the administration believes that Iran's retaliation against any US military action will be the same, regardless of the scope of the initial strikes. The goal is to maximize the military effectiveness of the air campaign, not only destroying Iran's nuclear capability, but rolling back the Iranian regime's ability to conduct conventional military operations.

As a possible pretext to such a "shock and awe" air campaign, the US has designated the Iranian Revolutionary Guards as a terrorist organization. The term is an accurate description, as the Revolutionary guards support and arm Hezbollah, while their elite Qods Force aids the Shiite militias in Iraq. It also helps us in cutting off funding for the Revolutionary Guards. But it also gives the US a justification for military action against Iran. By designating a significant portion of that country's military a terrorist organization, i's a pretext for strikes against the Revolutionary Guard "terrorists."

It's hard to say how Iran would react to a broad military operation which wiped out a significant portion of its military. While Iranian retaliation is a certainty, there are various degrees it could assume when unleashed. In a nightmare scenario, the Iranian military decides to "liberate its Shiite brothers from infidel occupation" in Iraq, while simultaneously starting a Hezbollah uprising aimed at either our allies in Lebanon, or against Israel. There's also no guarantee that our strikes will wipe out a deeply-buried Iranian nuclear program. For all we know, Iran might have a crude nuclear warhead that would be ready for use in such a situation.

As horrible as the thought of an Iranian nuke is, the consequences for retaliation are far worse in the near-term. Our best option remains the use of diplomacy, accompanied by covert support to anti-regime forces in Iran.

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