Day-um, Dubya...
Category: News Commentary... Thinking Allowed... War on Terror...
Posted Tuesday, September 19, 2006 at 12:11 PM [GMT-6]

There's a scene in John Carpenter's 1988 sci-fi cult classic (a euphemism for a movie that's so bad, it's actually good) They Live in which the character played by that consummate thespian and pro wrassler Rowdy Roddy Piper confronts the mean aliens intent on subjugating humanity and announces his intentions: I have come here to chew bubblegum and kick a**. And I'm all out of bubblegum.

The US President's address to the UN General Assembly a few moments ago reminded me of that quote.

Mr. Bush made John Bolton look like a silver-tongued devil as he went through a murderer's row listing of primarily Islamic nations which foster, support, or otherwise allow themselves to be used to advance terrorism, including Iran, Syria, Sudan, and Hezbollah in Lebanon. He spoke directly to the citizens of each nation, going over the heads, as it were, of their leadership...making it clear that it was that leadership that was at fault.

He addressed directly Iran's nuclear plans -- OK, its nookular plans -- stating plainly that (a) we were OK with the country having nuclear power, and (b) a program to develop nuclear weapons would not be tolerated. It'll be interesting to see how the Iranian president reacts in his address to the same body later this evening. I look for a measured response full of goodwill and diplomatic reciprocity. I also think the Houston Texans will win the next Super Bowl.

Equally interesting was what the President didn't talk about. He didn't express confidence in the United Nations as a body which could or would be instrumental in spreading democracy and liberty, or in fighting terrorism. He also didn't mention those partners-in-lunacy, Hugo Chávez and Fidel Castro (a brilliant tactic, by the way, given Chavez's megalomania; he's got to be really torqued at the snub).

Couple of final, random observations:

• I wish the cameras had spent more time on the delegates during the speech. At one point early in the address, one of the delegates from Lebanon seemed to be giggling like a teenager immediately following Bush's mention of Hezbollah's hijacking of that nation for an unprovoked attack on Israel.


• Perhaps I've spent too much time reading the Bible (ha!), but the roll call of the nations (including complimentary comments directed toward the people of Afghanistan, Iraq, and the United Arab Emirates) struck me as being very similar to the accounts of Christ addressing the seven churches in the first couple of chapters of the book of Revelation, where the merits and shortcomings of each were detailed, and warnings (or rewards) were issued. I certainly don't believe that was intentional, or that the President or his speech writers would even recognize the similarity. Just sayin'...

Technorati tag: United Nations