Wednesday, January 5, 2011

Ain't it a lovely world?

on the day johnny boner's gang finds itself in da house once again, it's just too exhausting to think about their program of obstructionism and gridlock for the next two years. the nation is teetering on the brink of something -- not even sure what any more -- and it seems like we need a more serious approach to our nation's challenges than trying to give the president a black eye at any cost.

that's where we're at, unfortunately.

in that spirit, i'd like to depart from the sorry spectacle here in the US seat of government, and look briefly at a story that i read on the politics daily website by david wood, their chief military correspondent (here). titled "pentagon surprised, concerned as china debuts hi-tech weapons," it is but one more reminder of how mentally deficient the US leadership is, and how the chinese will someday soon eat our lunch.

the chinese, it seems, have been busy developing the kinds of technologically advanced weaponry that will shortly render the great american ocean-going armadas obsolete -- vestiges of a bygone era. while we continue to pour untold billions of dollars building the aircraft carrier battle groups with all their bad-ass armaments, the reds have developed a ballistic missile that can sink these lumbering behemoths. so, as we go broke building the best 20th century navy, the asian hordes will render them useless for pennies on the dollar. so much for our ability to operate globally without challenge.

while the military will be busy thinking of new, ever more expensive countermeasures to offset the chinese gains, it seems quite obvious to me that the chinese have the initiative here, as we are so overly impressed with ourselves that we don't give a potential adversary credit for having either the ingenuity or tenacity to out-think or out-fight our side. this is why we're terminally bogged down in afghanistan, a debacle from which we'll only emerge defeated and humiliated.

the chinese, too, i'm afraid, are way smarter, more nimble and effective than we are. they are wise enough to realize that without a strong economic base, they could never last on the world stage, so every day you read about new investments they're making for strategic resources around the world. the US, on the other hand, sends its aircraft carriers around, and holds war games with its clients around the world as an implied threat to keep everyone in line. we may be broker than broke, living off borrowed dime, but we're still the greatest -- and don't you forget it.

for all these nations that are too busy building their economies to participate in the frivolous shows of bravado,  i'm certain we look slightly ridiculous -- still a force to be wary of, since we're so belligerent and unpredictable, but only one to be sneered at privately, as the comeuppance that we so richly deserve is not so far off. we will, it is all but certain, to meet the fate of other empires who responded to the own decline with first denial, and then ridiculous, self-defeating feats of compulsive arrogance.

this makes johnny boner and his buddies look all the more hopeless and clueless, as they pursue an agenda that will only hasten the demise of the very empire that sustains them.

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