The Patriot Post® · Rand Paul, I'm Talking to You!

By Burt Prelutsky ·
https://patriotpost.us/opinion/27917-rand-paul-im-talking-to-you-2014-08-08

Isolationists are always insisting that America can’t be the world’s policeman; what they don’t tell you is who should be. After all, even the most liberal pinheaded pacifist wouldn’t dare suggest this is a safe world. So who gets the job? The U.N.?!

There are two reasons that’s a lousy idea. The first is that the U.N. is incapable of keeping the peace even on a grammar school playground. Hell, they can’t even wipe out the few hundred members of Boko Haram, a name which apparently translates to “Western education is a sin,” but should conclude with “but kidnapping 300 Christian girls is a virtue in the eyes of Allah.”

The second reason is that all the worst foxes are already inside the big glass henhouse, and one of the very worst, Russia, sits on the Security Council and therefore has veto power.

I could add that this is an organization that has made a practice of condemning Israel on a regular basis for the past several decades, but never even censures China, Cuba, Iran, Pakistan or the Palestinians.

To get an honest picture of the U.N. and the world media, all you have to do, as my friend Donald Melquist suggests, is compare the reaction to Israel’s killing a thousand Arabs in Gaza in order to stem the firing of missiles and the burrowing of tunnels, to the fact that in nearby Syria, Assad has been responsible for the deaths of over 150,000 of his own people.

When civilian deaths, however justified, can be laid at the feet of the Israelis, we have cries of moral outrage from every corner of the globe and front page denouncements in the New York Times. When it comes to Assad, a butcher who has used poison gas to murder his political opponents, you can hear a pin drop. It’s a deathly silence, except, of course, for the screams of the dying.

As I see it, the problem isn’t with the U.S. serving as the world’s policeman, but that, unfortunately, in Obama we have a cop who prefers golfing and giving speeches to keeping the peace.

The most astonishing thing about modern times is that followers of Islam have declared a jihad on the West, but it is a war that the West refuses to acknowledge. Instead of taking on our common foe, Russia, Europe and America, all dither around, stepping on each other’s toes like the Three Stooges.

Instead of accepting that when they bomb train stations, pizza parlors, theaters and consulates, they mean business, the West pretends that it’s only a tiny group of zealots. Of course it was only a tiny group of zealots who overthrew Czar Nicholas, took over the Weimar Republic or, for that matter, sent King George III packing. Instead, we either go to war in order to defend one gang of Islamists from another or we bow and scrape, for fear that we may have bruised the feelings of some Muslim in Dearborn, Michigan, by pointing out that virtually every act of terror committed since 1979 has been accompanied by a cry of “Allahu Akbar!”

Every time I see one of those well-dressed lizards from CAIR showing up on TV claiming that Islam is as benevolent as the Shriners, I find myself wondering if we would have ever gone to war with the Nazis if Hitler had merely claimed to be spreading a religion known as Nazism and was not really out to conquer the world.

I hate to admit it, but when the three Central American presidents met with Obama and they blamed the drug cartels plaguing their nations on us, they were right. If millions of Americans hadn’t chosen to dedicate their lives to heroin, cocaine and marijuana, the drug cartels would be out of business by this weekend. I know it suits our vision of ourselves to blame farmers in Afghanistan for growing poppies or Latino thugs in L.A. for peddling the stuff, but if it weren’t for all those good solid Americans who can’t bear the thought of facing life if they can’t sniff, smoke or shoot some sort of crap into their bodies, addiction would just be a word in the dictionary.

A friend of mine suggested that a step in the right direction would be to decriminalize all drugs. I don’t think that’s any kind of solution. What I would really like to see happen is for people and especially judges to stop calling drug addiction a disease. A disease is something that happens to you, it’s not something you choose to go out and buy in an alley or on a street corner. And surely I can’t be the only person who is sick and tired of people breaking the law while under the self-induced influence and who then, instead of going to jail, get to enter rehab.

I know that some Republicans are concerned that in recent polls, Hillary Clinton has a 54% approval rating, and that in imaginary races against certain potential opponents, she’s running 10-12% ahead of them. I say we Republicans have nothing to fear but fear itself.

For one thing, her numbers have been falling for months, ever since we saw Hillary being Hillary on her book tour, talking about being flat broke in 2001 just before she and Bill scooped up $150 million in book deals and speaking fees, and boasting about how her reset button with Russia was a piece of brilliant diplomacy.

For another thing, when people are voting in fantasy face-offs two years before one side has even nominated a candidate, the results are meaningless. Keep in mind that once 2016 rolls around, the RNC will begin running TV spots in which night after night, we’ll all see Hillary, glaring through her Coke-bottle glasses, and barking “What difference, at this point, does it make who murdered four Americans in Benghazi?” I’m already salivating.

But in preparation for the all-important 2016 presidential election, it’s not too early for me to take the pulse of the electorate.

In this, my latest poll, I am asking that you let me know which of the following Republicans (listed in alphabetical order) you would like to see carry the Republican banner into battle.

Vote for just one person and please refrain from commenting, unless it’s to pay me a compliment. So keep it short and sweet, just like me.

Jeb Bush….Ben Carson….Chris Christie….Ted Cruz….Trey Gowdy….Mike Huckabee….Bobby Jindal….Susana Martinez….Sarah Palin….Rand Paul….Mike Pence….Rick Perry….Mitt Romney….Marco Rubio….Paul Ryan….Rick Santorum….Scott Walker….(Other).

Please take a moment and let me know who you favor by submitting your vote to me at [email protected].