People ask who is running this country.

People ask who is running this country.  I do not believe that there is any one single person or even a small group.  Never has been, at least in my lifetime.  The Founders set it up that way in an effort to make it responsive to the American people.  America was a reaction to King George.  The problem that we face today is not in Washington.  It is out here in the hustings, where, we refuse to discuss substantive problems intelligently with one another.  Because our political system is incapable of long term decision-making, the importance of the bureaucracy understandably increases and we are today ruled in very large part by unelected bureaucrats, which conservatives find unacceptable because they by-in-large reflect liberal values.

When the public elects one or another politician, that politician sees it as being critically important to govern by catering to their “base.”  You and I thus drive decision-making in Washington and it understandably reflects the divisions that we permit to exist in the body politic at large.  Compromise does not occur because America does not want it.  Were our two political sides not so evenly matched in numbers, the problem would be different.  Instead of flip-flopping every couple of years as the lack of compromise eviscerates the side in power, we would stumble down one or the other path as determined by shear numbers of voters, rather than any intelligent thought on the part of the public.

My appreciation of the situation is that the liberal side of the stupidity is prevailing and the nature of our demise, long term, will reflect liberal weaknesses, but please do not read this as being an endorsement of conservative “solutions.”  In my view, unadulterated conservatism is equally flawed.  Assuming no epiphany, I remain pessimistic about our ability to ward off a nuclear exchange with one or another foreign adversary because none of us out here in the hustings think beyond our body parts.

After the nuclear holocaust.

 So what would I do about the mess in the Middle East?  First, I would initiate an intelligent conversation here in this country about the Middle East.  It would involve thousands of years of very confused history and it would step on a lot of toes.  The reason that is necessary, is that a sensible US policy, that can be sustained into the future, requires an America that actually understands one of the most complex stories imaginable and is willing to pursue the sophisticated, difficult and expensive policy set that is required long enough for it to be effective.  Imperfect though it is, America is still a democracy and an informed public is necessary for an informed and sustained foreign policy.

A while back, I served as Political Advisor to the Commanding General of all US military forces in all of Europe, East and West, all of Africa, and all of the Middle East.  I decided that I needed to better understand the Middle East in order to do my job.  One of the things that I did was go to Jerusalem, and, on alternate days, take a tour of the exact same historic sites with first an Arab and then a Jewish guide.  It wasn't history, but it was an eye opener.  Another thing that I tried to do was discuss Arab/Jewish relations with representatives of the two cultures currently serving in an official capacity.  Never was I able to break through the hostility on either side of the divide to discuss possible compromises, and I tried mightily for the four years that I served in that capacity.   I faced the exact same mindless hostility that I face today in this country when I try to talk conservatism to liberals or liberalism to conservatives.

The same cultural ignorance clouds our understanding of all of the other ongoing conflicts that are alive and well in the Middle East and the rest of the world. The result is that our actions are driven by the hap hazard arrangement of issues that confront us at the moment, and we are knocked around as the various “situations” interact with one another, adding to the infinity of confusion.  A Saudi born journalist working for an American newspaper, is murdered in Istanbul and we brand the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia a pariah until we decide that we want more Saudi oil and think that it would be useful if he and an Israeli political leader, that our president does not like, should be good friends.  Meanwhile, out here in the hustings, we are trying to decide if we like a megalomaniac more or less than a confused little girl.  Never do we discuss anything meaningful.  In fact, we actively forbid that conversation as being harmful to our precious feelings.

And, at the same time that we squabble about the proper age of the fetus, the price of gasoline, the sign on the bathroom door, our “leaders” meddle ineffectively in wars all over the globe that they do not come close to understanding.  Ukraine, Gaza, Somalia, Venezuela, Haiti, New York, Chicago, Los Angeles ….  Men like Putin, Xi and Biden actually have their fingers on the nuclear button and you and I hide in our house hoping that somehow things will get better if we just elect the right leader.  In a few months we will usher the senile old man out of office and replace him with either “The Donald” or “The Brat.”  At that point our work will be done.  We can go back to “democratically” squabbling about our feelings and telling our foreign friends how to fight their wars.  You and I adamantly refuse to face reality, preferring wishful thinking instead.

We are an infinitely stupid people and we have been just clever enough to invent the tools that we need to destroy ourselves.  The question that intrigues me the most is what humanity will look like after the nuclear holocaust, but I sincerely hope that it happens after I and my loved ones leave the scene.

Gaza.

 I frankly admit that I do not well understand the situation in the Middle East, but I am equally certain that the United States government is not dealing with the region intelligently.  I much preferred the approach implicit in the Abraham Accords as compared to the appeasement inherent in both Biden and Obama’s policies.  The current focus, to the extent that there is any focus, is the conflict in Gaza, where the Biden/Harris Administration is floundering badly in exactly the same way that the Obama/Biden Administration did.

My understanding of the situation is that Hamas is but one of several Iranian proxies in the region, and Shia Teheran has ordered all of them to make trouble in an effort to thwart Sunni Riyadh’s efforts to control the region, in part through the Abraham Accords.  The American public is understandably focused on the horrible conflict in Gaza, but the game is much larger than just Gaza and the Palestinians.  It is the latest manifestation of the age old argument between Shia and Sunni Arabs complicated by the age old animosity between Arab and Jew.  Given that Teheran is either on the cusp of having a nuclear capability or already has such, we are looking at the very real possibility of a nuclear exchange that will benefit no one.

Israel is currently bent on destroying Hamas, believing it to be the only way to protect itself against further conflict.  Every single Hamas fighter that Israel manages to kill has a family, every single one of which will understandably hate Israel to their dying day.  I understand the hardliners in the Israeli government’s appreciation of the situation, but do not believe that it will accomplish anything positive and long lasting.  The current conflict is but the latest round of killing in a terrible conflict that has been going on for millennia.  The horrible part of October 7 is that Hamas targeted that element of the Israeli public that most wanted to end the conflict.  Every single one of the people killed that day were among the most liberal elements of modern Judaism.  I do not believe that point was lost on the leadership in Teheran.  Quite the contrary, I believe that to have been a central objective of October 7 and, combined with the horrible travesties that were committed that day, were a central part of Shia strategic thinking.

Teheran is not afraid of Jerusalem, or better put, Tehran is more afraid of Riyadh than it is Jerusalem.  October 7 was designed to stop Riyadh’s rapprochement with Jerusalem, not promote the interests of the Palestinian people.  The folks living in Gaza are merely pawns in the larger struggle and our confused participation in the mess merely magnifies the stupidity.  The Biden/Harris approach may well be the worst of all possible ways to deal with the mess that could be imagined, but we are now front and center in the killing, whether we like it or not.

PS:  I do not see the Abraham Accords as being the result of Trump’s brilliance.  The force behind that effort was the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia.  You remember him.  He is the guy that our current president called a pariah because he is believed to have sanctioned the bungled murder of a troublesome Saudi journalist that worked for an influential American newspaper.  The reason that I prefer Trump to Biden, in this situation, is that Trump had the foresight to champion the Saudi Crown Prince.  The reason that I dislike Biden’s approach to world affairs is that his actions are driven by his appreciation of ignorant public opinion in this country.

We are the modern Rome and it is way too bad.

 I was taught in school that I had the right to free speech and I enjoyed that right during a long life in what I honestly believe to be the most enlightened country in the history of the world.  I still have that legal right, but I find it to be increasingly difficult to exercise, not because of governmental restrictions but rather because of societal pressures.  It is an oversimplification, like most thought today, but I fall on the conservative side of most arguments and that puts me in the MAGA camp whether I want to be there or not.  I readily acknowledge that I disagree with the Brat even more than I disagree with the Donald.

I am an “active” senior citizen which means that I am out and about, rubbing shoulders with a wide variety of thought in the general public, but exchanging meaningful conversation about real problems with no one - absolutely no one!  When I try, I am shunned and, if I persist, I am subjected to whatever societal pressure can be mounted against me.  I am not rebutted, I am just told to shut the hell up, and, if I persist, societal pressure that impacts my economic viability is brought to bear.  I find myself retreating from the fight and it bothers me no end.  I have never done that before in my entire life and it raises questions about me that I find extremely troubling.  I am going along to get along, even as I understand that I, along with the rest of this country, am going down the wrong road.

If I were not part of all of this, it would be hilarious.  What we are doing to ourselves is pure unadulterated stupidity of the very highest order.  It is also very fundamental stuff.  The very nature of our people is changing in the most fundamental of ways.  American society is no longer what it was when I learned the societal rules.  As a kid, I believed in this country sufficiently to give up a student deferment and join the army at the height of the killing in Korea.  As an adult, I wholeheartedly participated in the effort to defeat the Soviet Union.  Today, I watch us become the laughing stock of a world that wants to eat our lunch and is actively preparing to try to do just that.  I honestly believe that our mindlessness risks our continued existence, because we and our principal adversaries have armed ourselves with nuclear weapons.  

Several things are at work on me.  I am finishing up my ninety second year on earth and do not function mentally or physically as well as I used to, and I increasingly question the value of the society that increasingly shuns me.  I am seriously tempted to sit back and watch history repeat itself once again as we swirl down the sewer pipe of history.  The only reason that I continue to try to get through to the rest of us, is habit.  It is not because I have any real hope of reversing things.  Wishful thinking is on the cusp of victory and nuclear obliteration is sure to follow soon thereafter.  The price of gasoline, the age of the fetus, the sign on the bathroom door and our precious feelings be damned.  We are the modern Rome and it is way too bad.