YOU CAN'T HAVE IT BOTH WAYS

Did you miss me? Okay, I just needed the right 'incident' to get me started. What is up with the 'immediate ceasefire'? I love American politics. On the one hand we have a huge group of people in our country crying outrage because of what is going on in Iraq. The general consensus is that the US has no business going into another country and dictating our own values, agendas, etc. How is this so different with what is going on between Israel and Lebanon?

Maybe I am the one not getting it. This is my take on the 'immediate ceasefire' calls from everyone. I think in general people are fools. There is no winning on the battleground of American politics. On the one hand you have a majority of people who feel like we should not intervene with the any conflict unless say it's another Pearl Harbor (in essence a direct attack on Americans). These same people are calling for us to now intervene in this other conflict that essentially has nothing to do with us at all. YOU CAN'T HAVE IT BOTH WAYS. This is the problem when you try to blanket policies. If your opinion is that we have no business interfering with other nations and what they do, then this is not our fight. People finally get the President to essentially do what they want and now it's the wrong thing to do.

I am appalled by the idea that no one is bringing this particular argument to the forefront. I feel like it is relevant and should be talked about. We as a people are the most wishy-washy people on the planet. I am a fairly black and white person. I feel like we go all the way in one direction or all the way in another. Now think this through, what people are proposing is for us to call for an immediate ceasefire and then provide troops for an international peacekeeping force. Why? So we can get bogged down in yet another conflict for how long? What would be the overall mission? What would happen if our troops went in and there was no clear cut plan on disengaging? Are you starting to see where I am going with this? I hope you do.

Thus, my statement for the day is... You can't have it both ways.

Your proposal is that we send our troops to an open ended conflict with no particular goals or disengagement strategy. On top of that, you relinquish control of those troops to some other entity (The UN or whomever else). And of course the topper; who is going to pay for all of this? Is the bill for Iraq not big enough for you? Stop asking for something that you've been asking for in Iraq and if that isn't enough you want to repeat the SAME action again because we don't agree with one side or the other. I don't like what is going on anywhere in the world. I think it is all a bunch of BS. What can you do? My only offer of solution is not to repeat the past. The Israel/Lebanon conflict will turn into another Iraq if we intervene. There is no way I could support something like Iraq again. I am not willing to let my family be put through this again. As differences of opinions collide I want to speak out as a voice for some of the families that are going through Iraq and Afghanistan. We don't want our loved ones in harms way for all of the !@#$%^&*( that have been critical about the battlefronts we are fighting right now.

So talk about sending troops as part of an 'international peacekeeping force' all you want. What if all of us just say, no more we won't protect you when you feel it is convenient and you should just stuff it. Be happy with the fact that the President has finally decided to take your advice and not get involved with another quagmire with no end in sight. If you don't like it, volunteer to do more to assist people in need in other places. Look at the slaughter and disease that has gone unchecked by the US and everyone else in Africa. Oh...you don't want to talk about that now do you?