SO, there's an old blowhard in my local paper complaining that the kids today are more concerned with their comfort than their freedom, and that's why military recruitment is down, and if we'd been such pussies
(profanity! ding ding- my paraphrase, of course the paper wouldn't publish that) in World War Two, we'd all be "speaking German on the East Coast and Japanese on the West Coast." With a creamy, redneck center, perhaps?
Well. Aside from being logically ridiculous, the thing that immediately got my goat was the disparaging references to the Japanese and German languages. Why do Americans- er, US citizens for all my sensitve Latino readers, whose nations do not in fact contain a reference to their continent rendering their objections grammatically moot- why do Americans fear foreign languages so much? Is it really so painful? Watashi wa Nihongo benkyooshimashita, und ich habe Deutsch studieren auch, and it really wouldn't bother me too much. Japanese food is lovely, and the Germans have regular spelling and decent beer. Budweiser? Only German in name, the gassy, watery, syrupy king of beers. King of beers in a world of piss, maybe.
The second thought I had was, God forbid the Germans or Japanese should run this country, we might have to endure universal health care in addition to their ungodly tongues! Of course that belittles our WWII vets and, except for the bastards who dropped the nuke, I apologize. You're swell.
But the whole self-righteous whining of these old hawks comparing other wars to WWII is played out and silly. Apples and key limes. Thanks for stopping Hitler, but please shut up. I'll be grateful when the last Cold War dinosaur (yes, I know WWII pre-dates the Cold War, but these bombastic geezers are all the same to me) joins that great Flag Day parade in the heavens. In their heaven, people will be signing up to die for whatever war the president has on that week. There's evil everywhere! Commies! Terrorists!
Hamburglars!Speaking of burgers, here's a pickle for you: if you feel America has a duty to exert military force abroad for, say, S. Vietnamese freedom, Iraqi freedom, etc. (as opposed to obvious humanitarian missions like the cessation of genocide in WWII, Kosovo, Rwanda- oops, we missed that one! Sudan...er...well, Condi said some words, anyway...) if you are not an isolationist, how do you explain our picking and choosing of who deserves freedom? Why don't we go free the Saudis? We need their oil. Why don't we invade China and free the Chinese? Because even if we drafted every American from 18 to 50 and devoted our economy to making bombs, we'd still lose. Even if we nuked the whole nation, those folks are tougher than cockroaches. I've seen them living in the exhaust fumes of idling buses under highway overpasses in our cities, and I knew a programmer from Singapore who lived on instant noodles, camped in a burnt-out shell of a house, and parked outside Starbucks to get a free internet connection. Their smooth, pale skin may render them vulnerable to ultraviolet rays, but they are aware of this and have taken to living in narrow, cave-like shops.
Ok, enough racism for today. I will remind the gentle reader I hate my own race more than any; Chinese are #2 because they consume just as voraciously as Americans, with the added quirk that their traditional medicine is driving uncounted species to extinction so they can eat turtles and
tiger-dick soup. Please, just try some Viagra!
