Last Laugh

I don't feel like adding to the hundreds of thousands of words that have already been written, spoken, and spouted concerning Ahmedinejad's visit to New York this past week and the domestic hatefest it generated. It's enough to say that the president of Iran has now been designated our current Satan incarnate, and that Saddam Hussein has a worthy successor, and one whose country contains almost as much petroleum as the dead dictator's.

I'll leave it to Dennis Perrin to sum up (from his blogpost, Booga! Booga!): "(W)hat (Ahmedinejad) says isn't important. He's merely an archetype that American politicians and their media megaphones can pelt with self-serving garbage. From Romney, to Hillary, to Rudy, to Pious Joe Lieberman, no one can overstate their case. The wilder, the better. In fact, I'd wager that Ahmadinejad is playing these and like-minded Americans for howling chumps. His ever-present grin is a giveaway."

Besides setting off ten thousand cable news replays of the two-minutes' hate, Ahmedinejad's visit was the subject of countless debates in internet discussion groups. It was at one of these I found myself entangled with a poster who referred to the Iranian prez as "subhuman scum," condemned him for homophobia among other things, then loftily opined that "some cultures are better than other cultures." I had to agree.

You have to wonder about cultures that don't lose old habits and attitudes that imperil their own survival. The Romans, for example, just kept on expanding their empire and making new enemies. It wasn't the smartest thing to do, in the long run.

An Associated Press story on the financial page on Thursday, 9/27, provided an example of what I'm talking about.

"Oil and other petroleum futures surged Thursday amid supply concerns sparked by a decline in crude inventories at a key Oklahoma terminal and the confrontation between the West and Iran."

So with oil at record high prices, we invite the prez of one of the world's largest oil-exporting countries over here so we can take target practice at him.

"Many traders are betting the West will take action against Iran before the end of the year, and worry that economic sanctions or a military strike will result in the disruption of oil supplies from the Middle East."

It's the mark of a superior culture I guess. Having allowed itself to become addicted to petroleum, the political arm of said culture responds by shooting itself in the gas tank.