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Monday, April 24, 2006



Maybe That's Why

By The Windjammer


I have been losing a lot of sleep lately wondering why Americans do not understand that we are at war. This one may turn out to be more important to our continued existence than any of the others in which we have been involved since the Spanish first started stealing land from the natives and committing mass murders on any who managed to escape death by the firesticks, sharp knives and K-9 corps of the invaders. The mass murders were from the newfangled diseases the invaders brought with them, minor ailments such as syphilis, smallpox, gonorrhea, tuberculosis and other assorted maladies against which the natives had no natural immunity or resistance.

P.S. I just read that the illegal immigrants into this country are now claiming that it was theirs first (a whopper of a lie) and they want it all back because their ancestors lost it in a fair fight with some Texicans aided by a few Tennessee hillbillies. There is ample evidence that some of the earlier settlers lived a bit south of Possum Kingdom Lake (TX) as much as 19,000 years ago. How about that for first comers?

I have reached the conclusion that the apathy is the result of poor eyesight, or rather the lack of being able to spot anything which would separate the enemy from the friendly folk who are being slaughtered right and left by their own kith and kin.

Back there at the time of the War for Independence, every colonial knew immediately who he should shoot at because he would be wearing a red coat. That was about the only thing that distinguished one from the other, since most of the foes and practically all the friends came from the British Isles or some other equally familiar place in Western Europe. The War of 1812 was the same. Every enemy would be flying the Union Jack, thereby making identification rather simple.

During The War Between the Sections, identification of an enemy became a bit more difficult, but, Heck Far, anyone ought to be able to recognize his own brother or uncle, even at a distance and over open sights.

World War I didn’t leave a whole lot of doubt. The combatants may have looked alike, but the enemy wore those helmets with the little pointy thing on top. An old vet told me that if you aimed at the very top of that little spike at 300 yards, you would likely hit the wearee right smack in the nose. Bullet drop, you know.

World War Two cleared up the I.D. problem considerably. The Nazis wore brown shirts and that backward swastika. Il Duce, not to be outdone by his friend and cohort, Adolph, went one shade darker and dressed his Fascisti in black shirts. The colors were so common that the boys who were to grow up to become storm troopers were called Brown Shirts and the ones who were to become Benito’s right-hand men were called, of all things, Black Shirts.

We had, in most cases, an enemy who could be easily identified so that we wouldn’t shoot any of our own or of our friends. And everybody carried his weapon on the outside.

Not so in this war. To an untrained eye (and I suppose even to a trained eye) all burkhas look pretty much alike unless they are white and covered with those little black dots. And it is almost impossible to tell at first glance what a body has strapped to his (or her) body underneath the poochy-out part of his aba. Heck Far, the guy standing beside you at the supermarket may suddenly blow himself to smithereens and mingle your bits and pieces with his bits and pieces until it is all but impossible to tell afterward who was which. Chances are about 237 to 1 that he won’t even be carrying a burgee so you would know to move a quarter mile or so to your right. F-A-S-T!

If you want to add a little confusion to your reckoning, the guy probably doesn’t care whether you are a good friend and ally or one of his bitter enemies. (He’s bitter while you don’t even know there is a war going on).

Put that in your hookah and smoke it.

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