I recognize that President Obama and his entire administration feel they are hostage to an infantile, irresponsible, pacifist “base” that cringes at the concept of the kind of combat that might occasionally be necessary to preserve our liberty and keep the evil in the world at bay. (I also recognize that the Paul faction in the Republican Party is similarly addled.) That our leaders cater to such confusion is regrettable, indeed, frightening, since it means that they value the welfare of the nation and the world less than the objective of keeping their most naive and ignorant supporters happy. (The alternative, that they feel the same way as this historically unschooled mass is too horrible to contemplate, and I just refuse to believe it.) But when kowtowing to the delusion causes our leaders to embrace Orwellian language designed to declare the opposite of truth in pursuit of political advantage, even those cheered by the fantasy have an obligation, as citizens and as responsible human beings with brains, to protest.
Secretary of State John Kerry just denied that dropping bombs on a state constitutes warfare. WAR IS PEACE, you see.
In Saudi Arabia, Kerry corrected CNN reporter Elise Labott when she described the widening armed conflict between the Islamic State and the United States as a war. “I think that’s the wrong terminology,” Kerry said. “What we are doing is engaging in a very significant counter-terrorism operation.
I think “Secretary of State” is the wrong terminology for John Kerry, come to think of it. I think “Perfect Embodiment of the Peter Principle” is more appropriate. “Irrefutable Explanation of Why George W. Bush Served Two Terms” is better too. Neither of these euphemisms for “John Kerry,” however, approaches the dishonesty and contempt for language and meaning that “significant counter-terrorism operation” does as a description of dropping bombs, which just isn’t something one does during peacetime.
Moreover, this contempt for obvious truth establishes a pattern. A government that will lie to the face of the public it serves cannot be trusted, and a public that allows its leaders to insult them with such obvious lies is assenting to being treated like sheep and fools.
The Obama administration has done this before, during the Libyan operations, when it denied that bombing was “hostilities” within the War Powers Acts. Refusing to be treated with such disrespect should not be a partisan matter: it’s a matter of civic responsibility. War is Hell; war is also war. It’s too bad that, once again, reality has mugged President Obama’s fond dreams, but it we allow our government to talk to us like idiots, then we are idiots.
Ethics Alarms 
He should have just used the speech I wrote a week or so ago when you said I was channeling your father.
I can’t discuss this tonight. I will tomorrow.
But too many 9-11 remberance specials only make me a very angry person, so I’m off to bed. This amount of fury can’t be healthy.
Tex, just a few words of encouragement, for future reference: Are you familiar with that teaching, about never letting the sun go down on your anger? (One interpretation, applicable to loving couples: Don’t give up to sleeping while you still have a bitter conflict to resolve. In a more humorous light: “Don’t go to bed mad at each other; stay up and fight – it’s more fun.”)
I have found that the anger-management teaching works, whether your anger is about a conflict with your spouse, or fury about other circumstances. If you get used to falling asleep while angry, you’ll only get less rest, and your next day’s burdens will only enrage you all the more.
Good luck with your health and future constructive fury.
Thanks for the advice, and when it comes to my wife, I seek rapid reconciliation. But when it comes to those who wish the destruction of our society, I prefer maintaining the anger towards them.
Ceterum, censeo Wahhabism esse delendam.
Is there a single member of the top membership of the Democrat Party who’s not an ideological imbecile? Is there a single leading member of their rank & file who’s not constantly asking himself, “What’s in it for me… and to Hell with the rest.”? Is there even 10% of the news media and the entertainment figures who aren’t self-worshipping yahoos who had an original or non-selfish thought in their lives? I’m with Tex. It’s been a long day.
Lieberman? (At least formerly…)
Isn’t he an independent?
I mistakenly believed he was still a registered Democrat when he was listed as “Independent Democrat”, but he apparently did formally remove his registration for his last term. Still, as a former Vice-Presidential nominee, who endorsed a non-Democrat in the wake Obama’s nomination, he could hardly be called a party sycophant.
Neville “peace in our time” Chamberlain
Yeah, when an ideology claims to stand for certain principles and then reality compels them to violate those principles, instead of changing ideology, just change the terminology…
You do know, of course, that all this Kerrymandering of English is merely cover for Bill Clinton’s peace on women.
I might have misspelled a word in that previous sentence…
Ha!