A long hard look in the mirror

It's been relatively easy to avoid posting about every off-the-wall comment made by Ahmadinejad and the Mad Mullahs. Such stuff gets tiresome after hearing it five or six times, and let's face it, how many more ways can they express their desire to blow Israel off the map?

So I was tempted to react accordingly to their latest can of blowhard, but something seemed different. See what you think:

"I would advise them to first get out of their quagmire in Iraq before getting into an even bigger one," General Safavi said with a grin.

Do you sense almost a pride of accomplishment there? Here's what one of the Ayatollahs was heard to say:

At a Friday prayer sermon in Tehran, senior cleric Ayatollah Ahmad Janati simply branded the US as a "decaying power" lacking the "stamina" to block Iran's ambitions.

Actually, sounds like a few comments out of a Howard Dean speech. But there's something more than just the usual "we will crush you" cacophony, it's a sort of "smell off the pile" thing--that America is a nation in decline and they are helping us get there.

This topic occasionally comes up amongst friends and invariably leads to the conclusion that America may indeed be past her prime. The obligatory comparisons to the Romans seem borne out by our levels of selfishness, greed, envy, lust, and arrogance, further illuminated by barbarian terrorists nipping at our heels while illegal aliens pour across the borders only to later march in our streets demanding rights. Poker is now seemingly on every channel 24/7, and the internet is one giant pseudo whore house.

We worship at the alter of tatooed-up, artificially enhanced athletes or fake tanned, fake boobed contestants on 'reality shows'. Our music as a whole, both black and white, has largely gone into the crapper compared to the 20th century.

Artifacts like the Ten Commandments or the 'Do Unto Others' creed have become quaint loser-speak and are doomed to disappear from the public consciousness. Christmas and Easter have become more about sales worship than deity worship. Simultaneously we treat the Mohammed figure with kid gloves to avoid an Islamohooligan butt-whipping or ruination of that almighty bottom line.

I fully realize this is totally in the eye of the beholder. Many would disagree with the characterization, but it sure seems the Iranians agree. They read CNN, and see Bush's dwindling approval numbers and hear the discord in the press. The resulting strategy is to go on the offensive, something sports fans should admire. It's similar to a baseball pitcher coming inside on a player recovering from a broken wrist, attack the weakness. America is strung out far and wide trying to defend the resources we're addicted to and the countries we've pledged to support, so there's a sly sense of "we've got your right where we want you" in their latest blubberings.

And our response? Tell me, do these comments from our Secretary of State give anyone a sense of confidence?

"There is no doubt that Iran continues to defy the will of the international community," Rice said, after Iran also dismissed a personal appeal from the UN atomic watchdog chief Mohamed ElBaradei

Iran's response?

"She is free to say whatever she wants," the president replied when asked to respond to comments by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice highlighting part of the UN charter that provides for sanctions backed up by the threat of military action.

"We give no importance to her comments," he said with a broad smile.

Such brazen arrogance should give pause, if nothing more than to resist the suggestion for Bush to just launch the damn missiles now.

I suspect their grins might emanate from a realization of a plan coming together, at least from their perspective. It's possible the entire war on terror was cleverly engineered by a cabal of Muslim countries with the goal of drawing us into a war we couldn't win like the Soviets before us. Bin Laden has admitted as much.

And he certainly tied our hands. We had to destroy the terror camps and those running them in Afghanistan. And although invading Iraq was debatable, nobody can argue that an Iraq with Saddam and his cozy relationship with Arafat was ever going to allow for Middle East peace.

So we're left in a tenuous, seemingly endless war. The treasury is being drained just when the boomers are about to collect social security. And while I think my parents might say that things looked gloomier in 1942, the wildcard in 2006 is the American public. Our blizzard of good fortune over the years has made us a soft and complacent nation.

Perhaps we might benefit from a look in the mirror. Is there some truth in what Ahmadinejad and his deranged buddies are saying about us? Are we willing to fight this fight with all our might if that's what it takes? Or are all of us, your humble correspondent included, just too accustomed to the 'good life' to make the effort? I'm not saying it's our fault entirely or that we should fold our tents and retreat to the horizon. I really don't know. But sometimes an offhand comment from a friend or even terrorist enemy can help us see things a little bit clearer.

MORE 4/15/06

While I suspect Richard Clarke might be correct in his assessment about the by-products of an attack on Iran, the problem with such pontificating is to ignore solutions. For example, short of an attack, what do we do, Mr. Clarke? The Mullahs are laughing at the world's hollow threats.

REFLECTION WITHOUT THE GUILT 4/16/06

Offered by Mark Steyn:

President Ahmadinejad, who is said to consider himself the designated deputy of the "hidden Imam," held a press conference this week -- against a backdrop of doves fluttering round an atom and accompanied by dancers in orange decontamination suits doing choreographed uranium-brandishing. It looked like that Bollywood finale of ''The 40-Year-Old Virgin,'' where they all pranced around to "This Is The Dawning Of The Age Of Aquarius."

It's funny, but like most everyone else he's clear on what NOT to do, but kinda fuzzy on the alternative.

TO BOMB OR NOT TO BOMB 4/16/06

It's a long piece, but required when trying to cover all the possibilities in this convoluted thing.