I’m gonna stick with “protect the borders.”

I don’t keep posting here trying to get any “last word,” by the by, I just enjoy it. I’m not saying you accused me of any such thing, it just popped into my head.

I’m sure we agree on many things.

Second (and of far less import), I would point out that times were a bit different when Adolf, Benito, and Hideki started throwing their weight around. We were mired in the Depression and eyebrows-deep in isolationism with a capital “I.” Even so, we didn’t completely ignore the situations in Europe and Asia. A group of Americans decided to take things in their own hands and joined Claire Lee Chennault in China to form the Flying Tigers. FDR set up the Lend-Lease Act.

And then Pearl Harbor happened.

As I alluded to in “Risk Aversion,” this generation had its Pearl Harbor on September 11, 2001.

Which brings us back to whether or not we responded to 9/11 correctly. As I think I’ve stated multiple times above, I AGREE with you on this. I don’t think the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq were necessary. I don’t think nation-building is a good idea. I do think we should get out of Iraq.

I do NOT, however, think we need to stop fighting the War on Terror. We just need to fight it differently, more efficiently, and more effectively.

I don’t believe for an instant there was any humanitarian motive involved with either the Iraq or Afghan wars. The oppression of those folks, by, respectively Saddam Hussein and the Taliban, didn’t bother anyone much until Prez decided to protect us from non-existent (and known to be non-existent, if you ask me) “weapons of mass destruction.” I believe “regime change” wars are pretty much illegal, and, if not, certainly immoral. Let the people of those nations bleed for their “freedom” if that’s what they want (and it isn’t).

Neither war has, or can, accomplish anything, in my opinion.

Oh, and I am a war veteran.

I’ve been to your blog, and you do yourself a disservice if you don’t think you write well, too.

Teddy was a president to be admired, wasn’t he? So was FDR. I never shy away from the opportunity to say I think FDR was the last great president this country had. Too bad the Roosevelts couldn’t have had the political stamina the Kennedy’s have had, huh?

TwoBlue: there’s absolutely no way to deny that we’ve supported some scumbags in our time. Saddam Hussein himself, for example. Manuel Noriega. Ngo Dinh Diem.

However, I don’t think we’re against vile dictators “all of a sudden.” Mussolini, Tojo, and Hitler ring a bell?

No, I wouldn’t have expended the treasure and lives now gone to liberate the Iraqi people. I don’t even say that in retrospect. I said that back in 2003. As I said in “The Scalpel vs the Hammer,” we’ve been fighting this war incorrectly from the get-go.

I would have simply put a .50 cal. BMG round between Hussein’s eyes from about a mile or so away.

To paraphrase Private Jackson from “Saving Private Ryan, “What I mean by that, sir, is if you was to put me and this here sniper rifle anywhere up to and including one mile from (Saddam Hussein)… with a clean line of sight… Pack your bags, fellas.”

(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xXy-tqLf24U. Within the first 1:10 or so of the clip)

Boondoggle all the way. Wasted lives. Wasted money.

In retrospect, would you have expended the treasure and lives now gone to “liberate” the Iraqi people?

Afghanistan. A black hole for every army which ever went in. A black hole for us.

However, if you look at the history of terrorism, you’ll see that it is their standard modus operandi to make hit and then lay low. Make your statement, do your damage, let your target respond with a show of force, and then wait. Sooner or later your target will lower his defenses. He’ll eventually do so because either he feels safe and therefore the measures he’s put in place are no longer necessary, and/or because those measures are expensive, both in terms of manpower and in terms of money.

Whatever mistakes Bush has made or people say he has made, I am far happier that he was the one in office on 9/11 and since then instead of Al Gore!