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M.A.D
Some people, not nearly enough, are offended by the gerontocracy running America. Me, I've become a better American over the years, learning to ignore who's wielding the pike and who's getting stuck. Occasionally, I'm still entertained. Take for example the other day President Biden warned about “Armageddon.” What's most amusing about the President is every once in awhile some old synapses start firing somewhere in the back of the brain and something from the past spews out of his mouth.
Now, most would say the Book of Revelation isn’t loaded with laughs, they might try reading it, but a couple reactions to the President's statement certainly were humorous. First, a scolding delivered from the always frivolous French President Macron saying, "We must speak with prudence when commenting on such matters.” Now, what precisely he meant by prudence is a good question, I guess wait until you really mean it?
But better, the Wall Street Journal Editors chiding, “Biden Riffs on Armageddon.” First, the Journal courageously hypothesizes Putin's use of nuclear weaponry would only provoke, “Ukraine’s fury causing it to press on, no doubt with more support from the U.S. and NATO.” – funny, funny stuff.
But then comes the punchline,
“If he really does fear a nuclear escalation, he owes more of an explanation to the American people than cocktail-party doomsday chatter. He needs to marshal support in Congress and around the world to do everything possible to deter Mr. Putin. A crucial part of deterrence in a democracy is preparing the public for the challenges it might confront. Instead his comments have needlessly frightened Americans and maybe undermined deterrence.”
“In a democracy,” such that anything can be called a democracy where one person can launch nuclear weapons.
Then, “preparing the public for the challenges it might confront,” which can only mean preparing them for nuclear confrontation.
As far as, “Needlessly frightened Americans,” well, I'm not sure very many Americans pay attention to what the president is saying at any given time these days. I know for sure almost none of them pay much attention to this war, even though it does indeed involve the second largest nuclear power on the planet. In a couple weeks, not one vote will be won or lost on this war. A war that could have very easily been avoided and now just as easily ended with just a little talk.
But the final line is best, “maybe undermined deterrence.” See, here is where the President's channeling the past. If you remember the Cold War, and at this point you have to be pretty old for that, lord knows what the American school system teaches about it, but it was insanity induced by a new, awesomely powerful technology birthed from the fundamental matter of the universe. Out of this insanity came a crazy policy of deterrence called, “Mutually Assured Destruction”(MAD).
MAD was the idea the Soviets and Americans both have enough nukes to destroy the world, thus keeping either side from using. This was the thinking pouring from the greatest minds in the highest offices of the National Security State. If you read American thinking, then and now, MAD is credited, instead of sheer dumb luck, for nukes never being used after Nagasaki.
So you see, the President was just hitting with a blast from the past. No doubt there's more than a few National Security State operatives jogging his memory. Over the years, the Wall Street Journal wrote plenty supporting the MAD doctrine. You'd have to search pretty hard to find one word they ever printed against it. I guess they forgot.
As far as invoking Armageddon, well there's plenty of presidential precedent. Old Ron Reagan, about who the Wall Street Journal never wrote a bad word, did it regularly, quoting scripture and claiming, “Russia is going to get involved in it.” Always that Reagan humor!
Anyway, this bloody stupid war escalates, destructive to all involved, but none more so than the Ukrainians. Meanwhile, there's some 13,000 nuclear warheads in the world more than enough for rapture. Even the French, by some ridiculous quirk of history have several hundred nukes, maybe not enough to bring about end times, but they sure could unleash a new la Terreur. Over the years, I've met plenty of would be Jacobins and want to be Robespierres.
What's on the other channels?
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