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发帖数: 29846 | 1 Here, abroad there is a lot of it going around
by Oliver North
08/30/2011
WASHINGTON -- For most of the year, irrational behavior is a natural state
in our nation's capital. This is a place where potentates and politicians,
lobbyists and legislators and the elite and the lowly routinely say and do
completely irrational things.
We also have come to expect that irrational behavior takes a brief hiatus
when Congress goes home on recess and the president of the United States
heads out of town on vacation. This year is the exception that proves the
rule. POTUS may be playing golf on Martha's Vineyard and Congress may be out
of town, but this week, irrational behavior disorder -- "IBD" for short --
went viral, here and around the globe.
The Obama family started the IBD epidemic by setting off on their "working
vacation" with two separate U.S. Air Force flights from Washington to the
Massachusetts coast, requiring hundreds of military personnel, Secret
Service agents and support staff to cancel or abbreviate leave. No one has
figured out yet how much this little caper has cost the taxpayers.
On Aug. 20, just as the first family was getting into the swing of things on
their little island paradise, Libyan rebels launched their own version of a
"Thunder Run" into Tripoli. The Transitional National Council promptly
caught a case of IBD and announced it had "liberated Libya from the dictator
" Moammar Gadhafi. In Benghazi, the TNC's "chairman," former Gadhafi
"justice minister" Mustafa Abdul-Jalil, told the international media that
the rebels had "captured three of Gadhafi's sons" and "surrounded Gadhafi's
Bab al-Aziziya palace" in Tripoli and that "escape is impossible." We also
were told, "All of the country will be in the hands of the TNC very shortly.
" Turns out it was another case of IBD.
The rebel advance -- and the anticipated demise of the murderous Moammar --
was briefly celebrated with exuberance in our household. Back in 1987,
Gadhafi sent his goons to kill us.
Thanks to the FBI and special agents of the Naval Criminal Investigative
Service, his thugs missed their prey. We certainly aren't going to miss him.
As it turns out, our dose of IBD was short-lived compared with the case
caught by the White House spin doctors on Martha's Vineyard. They wanted the
American people to focus on the "improving economy." On Sunday morning, CBS
ran a prerecorded interview with President Obama, in which he acknowledged
"an unemployment rate that is still too high" and then baldly claimed that
the administration has "actually made the right decisions" and that he
expects "to be judged a year from now on whether or not things have
continued to get better."
It's the "continued to get better" part that confirms a diagnosis of severe
IBD, compounded by rhetorical euphoria syndrome, or RES. When Obama was
sworn in as our 44th president, the unemployment rate was about 7.5 percent.
It's now 9.1 percent. Millions of Americans have lost their homes and are
out of work. Some experts say the housing market has yet to hit bottom.
American manufacturing productivity continues to drop. U.S. financial and
commodity markets are on a roller coaster, and our government's credit
rating has been downgraded.
That's not exactly what a re-election campaign strategist wants us to be
thinking about. On Monday, after British Prime Minister David Cameron
announced he was "cutting short" his holiday "to address the crisis in Libya
," the O-Team trotted POTUS off the golf course so he could tell us that "
the future of Libya is now in the hands of the Libyan people." Obama did not
mention his March 22 pledge that the military operations he had authorized
would be over in "a matter of days and not weeks."
It turns out that all of this was more IBD and untreated RES. By Wednesday,
when Libyan rebels succeeded in their sanguinary fight to capture Gadhafi's
compound in the heart of Tripoli, the despot had disappeared. His palace was
looted, but the megalomaniac who ruled Libya and terrorized the world for
seven days short of 42 years had fled.
With Gadhafi still in hiding, U.S. officers say depots full of Libyan
weapons -- including man-portable surface-to-air missiles -- may already be
in the hands of radical Islamic terrorists. Stockpiles of nuclear materials
and precursor chemicals for making nerve agents and mustard gas have yet to
be recovered by French and British special operations personnel. And
Pentagon planners are looking at options in case Libya descends into anarchy
. One officer describes such a scenario as "Somalia on steroids."
Obama supporters now claim his policy of "leading from behind" has been
vindicated by the demise of the Gadhafi dictatorship. Though the regime
finally has collapsed, only those diagnosed with irrational behavior
disorder believe that the people of Libya will realize the president's
promise of "a peaceful transition to democracy" any time soon.
Oliver North is the host of "War Stories" on Fox News Channel and the
author of "American Heroes in Special Operations." Join him on the
Caribbean Freedom Cruise, which sets sail Oct. 22. To find out more about
Oliver North and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and
cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com. |
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